Espresso Capital Partners

Greg Smith

Greg is an entrepreneur first and a finance guy second. He bootstrapped his first software company at the age of 24 and sold it 7 years later in March 2000. After spending two years in a VP-Product Marketing role, he joined BDC Capital as part of their Technology Seed Investment group—a $100M early stage venture fund.

At BDC, Greg led or co-led investments in numerous companies, each at varying stages of conception—from university spin-outs to pre-commercial, early revenue companies. He was a Director on the boards of SiM Composites, Mobidia Technologies Inc, Adnavance Technologies, and General Fusion. He is currently on the Board of Tagga Media and acts as an advisor to numerous technology companies.

Greg holds a Bachelor of Applied Science — Mechanical Engineering — from the University of British Columbia.

Gary Yurkovich

Gary Yurkovich is an experienced and successful executive in the technology industry. Previously, Gary was the Vice President of Sales, Marketing and Service for Creo Products where he helped grow the company from $6M to over $125M in revenue over a 3 year period prior to being purchased by Kodak for $1B. He was also the VP Sales and Corporate Development for BrightSide Technologies which was purchased for $28M by Dolby Labs in 2007 and was also COO of Resolution Health in San Jose, Ca which was recently purchased by Wellpoint.

Gary started his career with Digital Equipment Corporation where he served in a variety of management and operational positions, and was one of the most highly recognized contributors in the company’s history. He is a BCIT graduate in Electronics and has a B.Sc. in Biochemistry and Genetics from the University of British Columbia. Gary currently sits on the Board of Directors of several technology companies including Clevest Solutions, Rapid Electric Vehicles, Wolf Medical Systems, and BC Social Venture Partners.

Garron Helman

Garron Helman is a seasoned executive who has built successful small and large technology companies around the world. He is actively involved as an investor, mentor and team member in a number of technology companies. Prior to returning to Toronto, Garron was the Managing Director, Asia Pacific region of Kodak’s Graphic Communications Group, a $300M business, and Vice President of Kodak’s GCG $3.7B division from 2005 to 2006. Garron was Corporate Vice President of Creo and Managing Director of Creo Asia Pacific from 2002 to 2005 prior to the sale of the company to Kodak for $1B. Garron served as Managing Director, Australia and New Zealand, where he established Creo's presence in the market growing the business from $0 to $30M.

Garron holds a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology and a Bachelor of Engineering Science in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Western Ontario and an Masters of Business Administration from the University of British Columbia.

Paul Cataford

Paul has been in the early-stage high technology industry for over 20 years. Previous positions include: President and CEO - University Technologies International (commercialization and early-stage incubation); Executive Managing Director - NB Equity Capital Partners (PE and VC); President and Managing Director - BCE Capital (VC). Paul currently sits on the boards of Sierra Wireless Inc. (TSX and NASDAQ) and Hemisphere GPS Inc. (TSX). Paul is also the CEO of Zephyr Sleep Technologies Inc. - a medical device company. Paul has been involved in starting 12 companies, has invested in over 25 companies with a successful track record of significant returns. Paul lives in Calgary, Alberta.

Paul holds a Mechanical Engineering degree (Queens), an MBA (Schulich) and an ICD.D (Rotman).