Join entrepreneurs, investors, U of T alumni and power couple, Allen and Eva Lau for the Desjardins Speaker Series: School of Fish – Lessons Learned from Swimming Upstream on March 7.
This candid conversation will cover a broad range of topics, including:
- The Wattpad story and insights from building and exiting a game-changing venture
- Advice for early-stage founders
- The current investment climate and the Two Small Fish approach to early-stage VC
- Opportunities and challenges for the Toronto and Canadian innovation ecosystem
- Trends and thoughts on key industries and technologies, including AI, quantum, electric vehicles and more.
Audience members are invited to submit their questions for the Q&A portion of the event moderated by Bianca Bharti, newsletter editor at BetaKit. Registration is now open for in-person or virtual attendees.
About the Speakers
Allen Lau
Allen Lau is an operating partner at Two Small Fish Ventures. He is also the co-founder and former CEO of Wattpad, the world’s leading social storytelling platform. Allen directed a global team to leverage groundbreaking technology to fundamentally disrupt the entertainment industry Under his leadership, Wattpad grew into a community of nearly 100 million users, raised USD $120 million from top VCs around the world, and realized a successful exit in a transaction valued at more than C$840M – one of the largest tech acquisitions in Canada
Allen is a visionary serial entrepreneur, a leader in Canada’s tech community, and a sought-after speaker and authoritative voice on entrepreneurship, the innovation economy, and the benefits of a diverse workforce.
He is a member of the Canadian Council of Innovators, a lobby group that advances the interests of Canadian technology companies at all levels of government. He also sits on the board of the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) and MaRS Discovery District, North America’s largest urban innovation hub.
Allen received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Toronto’s Electrical Engineering program. In 2020, he was inducted into the Engineering Alumni Hall of Distinction at the University of Toronto.
Eva Lau
Eva Lau is a respected entrepreneur-turned-investor and one of the few women leading a venture fund in Canada. As the founding and general partner at Two Small Fish Ventures, she leverages her experience to help early-stage transformative tech companies achieve internet scale.
With a sharp focus on investing in companies with strong network effect as their defensibility, Eva created the ASSET framework that many entrepreneurs and accelerators have since adopted as part of their business strategies. She is widely regarded as an expert in this area.
Before launching TSFV Eva was a founding team member of Wattpad, one of Canada’s most successful tech companies. As head of the community and content for the storytelling platform, she helped the company scale from hundreds to tens of millions of users.
Prior to Wattpad, she was director of product development of Brightspark Labs, a Toronto-based accelerator, where she mentored numerous local startups.
Eva continues to offer her time and expertise to help other tech companies succeed and is involved with many incubators and accelerators. She also serves on the board of many startups as well as Volta, Upside Foundation, and Branksome Hall.
Eva has a bachelor’s degree in Industrial Engineering from the University of Toronto and an MBA from the Schulich School of Business.