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Welcome to this week’s Thursday Feature, brought to you by Dine Around. In this issue, meet the young inventors who took home a top prize for their work, learn about a summit with $250,000 up for grabs, and get to know the products and ideas our local tech leaders are raving about.

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Young innovators develop technology to prevent hypothermia

A pair of local Grade 8 students at St. Michael's University School have invented a self-heating lifejacket and taken home the top prize at a provincial STEM competition for youth.

Fraser Tuck and Liam Pope-Lau were named as Innovators of the Year in their age category and won the People's Choice Award at the 2022 Youth Innovation Showcase for their invention, named LifeHeat: The Self-Heating Lifejacket. The product generates heat when immersed in water and was developed to prevent hypothermia. "The idea came from when I was sailing in the summer before Grade 6, and then I capsized — my boat flipped over," said Pope-Lau. "And then I just realized how cold it was in the water."

Pope-Lau and Tuck quickly got to work that school year. At their Grade 6 science fair, they focused on finding an appropriate exothermic chemical — one that would generate heat in a reaction with water. Once they landed on using calcium chloride, a big challenge was finding the an appropriate amount of the chemical to use in the lifejacket, said Tuck. "In our first actual ocean test, we actually burned ourselves because the lifejackets got so hot," said Pope-Lau.

The two boys then went through 12 different designs — sourcing and sewing the materials themselves — before finally landing on a final minimum viable product. They mostly used second-hand items to develop LifeHeat, thanks to platforms like Facebook Marketplace. Pope-Lau said they would search for the materials they needed, such as polyester, neoprene, and fleece, and then meet up with local sellers, thanks to the support of their parents.

Was there anyone else out there making a self-heating lifejacket? Tuck said that they had only found two. The first was described in an article online. "Although we didn't really trust the source because they use a different chemical called calcium oxide, which is easily known for getting to temperatures over 200 degrees Celsius in the water and then catching fire," he said. "And then they also used kilogram of it." The second Pope-Lau found recently, but is gas-powered.

So what's next for the two boys? First, they're looking for a patent lawyer. Second, they want to partner with companies to better improve their product. They each took home $5k and hope to reinvest it back into their invention. They're already one step ahead and are meeting with BC Ferries in the near future to discuss what a partnership could look like. So stay tuned — you could see a LifeHeat on your next trip to the mainland soon.

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📰 More Victoria innovation news

💰$250K up for grabs: The deadline for startups and investors to enter the fifth-annual OKGN Angel Summit is fast approaching. Applications for the Accelerate Okanagan-hosted event close on December 16, 2022. Read more.

🔦Community spotlights: We're running a series of profiles on the finalists for the 2022 Victoria Tech Community Awards, taking place this December 8. Check out our latest spotlight featuring Scott Beaty, CEO of MarineLabs. Read more.

💻 No coding skills? No problem: Victoria-based global software development company AOT Technologies today announced an updated version of formsflow.ai. The tool is an open-source, low-code platform that empowers organizations to rapidly build business applications with little to no programming skills. Learn more.

🤝 Capitalism and impact investment: Did you miss the South Island Prosperity Partnership's (SIPP) Rising Economy 2022? Or are you still mulling over your notes from the packed days of thought leadership? SIPP has uploaded recordings of the conference's sessions. Check out this video of InBC's CEO Jill Earthy on a panel discussing how impact investment operates under capitalism, alongside local and international leaders in the space. Watch here.

🕴️ Tech jobs of the week

Find your next career:

• Logistics & Customer Service Specialist at Seastar Chemicals

• Economic Futures Analyst at South Island Prosperity Partnership

• .NET Framework Developer at Megabyte Programming Services

• Business Development Representative at VINN Automotive Technologies

Hiring in Victoria? Reply to this email and let us know!

📅 Upcoming events

December 8: 2022 Victoria Tech Community AwardsHave an upcoming event? Reply to let us know.