Disruptors

There is a shift happening in retail. Angela Ahrendts, former SVP of Retail at Apple and CEO at Burberry joined us on RBC Disruptors to discuss the trends she's seen from her time at two iconic global brands and to share her vision for the future of retail.

Some say cryptocurrency is the future of money. Others think it’s a house of cards that’s going to come crashing down any minute. We hosted a lively discussion about the future of cryptocurrency at our RBCDisruptors event on April 26, 2018. We heard from an entrepreneur who is bullish on the benefits of cryptocurrencies, a venture capitalist who thinks the hype has grown out of control, and a blockchain researcher who says companies needs to understand crypto’s disruptive potential.

Apple, Google, Facebook and Amazon control huge swathes of our online lives. That's why we need to seriously consider breaking them up, according to NYU marketing professor Scott Galloway. In his new book, The Four, Galloway makes the case that these original disruptors have come to form an oligopoly—one that is stifling innovation. He says we need a radical new approach to regulating the big four.

Dan Schulman is President & CEO of Paypal, a worldwide online payments system that supports online money transfers and serves as an electronic alternative to traditional paper methods like cheques and money orders. He spoke with RBC CEO Dave McKay at the recent RBC Capital Markets Technology, Internet, Media and Telecommunications Conference in New York City to discuss how Paypal transformed to a customer champion company, changing their strategy from product to platform.

Peoples’ viewing habits are shifting dramatically, with the rise of streaming services and mobile viewing – yet, digital isn’t stopping live entertainment from drawing crowds. Cameron Bailey and Joana Vicente – the co-heads of the Toronto International Film Festival joined the 50th episode of RBC Disruptors to speak to the power of audience in an age of digital experience.

As part of our look at the skills revolution in Canada, we headed down to the Niagara Peninsula to see how one of Canada’s largest wine companies is training the next generation. Andrew Peller Estates has a partnership with Brock University, bringing in co-op students and building their skills through on-the-job training. RBCDisruptors producer Peter Henderson sat down with John E. Peller, whose grandfather founded the company, and Emma Garner, one of Peller’s top winemakers, to talk about the winemaker of the future. Part two of three. To read the skills report, go to www.rbc.com/humanswanted

In the age of automation, we are undergoing a skills shift. By 2022, 54% of frontline workers will need significant reskilling. Carol Leaman, CEO of Axonify joined us on RBC Disruptors to discuss how they are revolutionizing the way companies retrain their frontline workers

When Ritual CEO Ray Reddy was a product manager at Google, he learned a trick from Larry Page: the toothbrush test. If you can use a product twice a day, it will become habit-changing. A ritual. Reddy took this premise and applied it to the last frontier of digitization: the local market. At its core, Ritual is about connecting the physical and digital worlds by monetizing the local, in-person experience. He joined us at the last RBC Disruptors event to share how he’s working to make lines a thing of the past, allowing customers to place orders ahead of time.

Canada’s tech sector needs more swagger. That’s according to Shopify COO Harley Finkelstein, who says part of his company’s runaway success has been the ability to sell itself—to customers and to potential employees. After hiring 200 people from 50 countries over the past two years, Shopify is looking to add thousands more in its Ottawa HQ and around the world. To meet those needs they’ve partnered with Carleton University on a new degree program, are supporting coding camps for kids in elementary and high schools, and are making Canada a destination for international talent.

Technology is disrupting the brain. Dr. Murali Doraiswamy, a physician and brain scientist at Duke University highlighted that 8%-10% of people in North America show signs of a serious addiction to the Internet and gaming - on this special episode we turned our minds inward - Murali shares his perspective and research on how technology is changing the brain and mind.

With traditional career paths in flux, some millennials are choosing entrepreneurship and staking their future on themselves. At a special RBCDisruptors session for RBC's summer interns, three young entrepreneurs explained why they took the plunge—and why others should follow in their footsteps. This episode's guests are Emma Harris, 25, whose company Healthy Pets focused on telemedicine for pets; Emily Bland, 23, who co-founded SucSeed to build hydroponic grow tanks in remote communities; and Daniel D’Souza, 22, who helped found inclusion-training startup Crescendo.

John Chen didn't set out to be The Turnaround Guy. He just played to his strengths. He’s had plenty to fix at BlackBerry, the iconic Canadian tech company he took over as executive chairman and CEO in 2013. BlackBerry’s CEO & Executive Chairman says he’s driven to do what others think isn’t possible. He spoke at the last RBC Disruptors about trade tensions between the U.S. and China, the future of mobile devices and how artificial intelligence is changing cybersecurity.

If you’re looking for the future of digital government, you’ll find it in the unlikeliest place: the tiny European nation of Estonia. The country offers nearly all of its government services online, and Estonians are behind Internet innovations such Skype and Kazaa. Siim Sikkut is the man charged with making sure Estonia stays on the cutting edge, and we sat down with him at C2 in Montreal to talk about what Estonia can teach the rest of the world.

Netflix is maybe the biggest disruptor of them all. Ten years ago, the company made most of its money sending DVDs by mail. Now, it’s bigger than Disney—the most valuable media company on earth. Jessica Neal is head of talent at Netflix, and it’s her job to maintain the company’s culture of innovation. This episode is live from the C2 conference in Montreal.

Hauling away other people's junk, 1-800-GOT-JUNK? founder Brian Scudamore has seen it all: a mountain of escargot shells, a naked man and $400,000 in cash hidden under the floorboards. A lifelong entrepreneur, he’s also seen what it takes to succeed in business — and how failing is vital to learning how to get things right. At the last RBCDisruptors, Scudamore spoke about being willing to fail and the leadership lessons he’s learned along the way.

On New Year’s Eve, BlueDot—a Toronto technology company aiming to fight epidemics using AI—saw something concerning. By the next day, BlueDot had alerted its clients of the possible outbreak of a novel coronavirus in Wuhan, China—days before the World Health Organization. On RBC Disruptors, meet Dr. Kamran Khan, a Canadian physician and entrepreneur using AI and Big Data to create an early-warning system for infectious diseases. Khan and John Stackhouse discuss: How BlueDot’s early warning system detected the 2020 coronavirus ahead of everyone else Why Canada is a challenging environment for healthcare innovation How societies struggle in 2020 to contain infectious diseases despite a wave of new technologies Sign up for the RBC Disruptors email newsletter at rbc.com/disruptors.

It's the secret that drives Silicon Valley’s best: the growth mindset. It’s about failing fast, learning fast, and growing fast. PagerDuty's Jennifer Tejadahas built a growth mindset into her company. She tells us about filling out the CARD: the candour, ambition, resilience and diversity that are common to every great growth company.

Millions of people have turned to wearables to track their steps, monitor their heart rate and sleeping patterns, and more. For many of us, the fitness tracker is a constant companion. Should tracking our mental health be any different? This was the theme of the latest RBC Disruptors in advance of Mental Illness Awareness Week. This episode's guests are former Olympian and mental health advocate Silken Laumann, Sam Duboc of BEACON and Dan Seider of Stigma.

The changing nature of work is keeping millennials and gen Z up at night. In a tech-driven economy, the path to success is no longer clear -- so young people are taking control. On this episode of RBC Disruptors, two young entrepreneurs joined us to explain why they founded their companies—and why others should follow in their footsteps. This episode's guests are Julia Kirouac, Founder & CEO of NudFud, and Braden Ream, Founder & CEO of VoiceFlow.

When it comes to business transformation, Patrick Pichette has seen it all. The former chief financial officer at both Google and Bell Canada has over 25 years of financial and operating expertise and has led world-class companies like McKinsey and Sprint Canada to break through the complexities of hyper growth, and to execute large, transformative programs. This episode is live from RBC’s National Market Leaders Conference.