The Startup Founder's Journey: Featuring Chancellor Nizar J. Somji

​On the surface the startup founders journey you read about are often very glamorous: six figures in month one, overnight unicorn, "quit my job and never looked back." In reality, most founder journeys are slower, messier, and far more non-linear than the highlight reels suggest.

​For our opening Explorer session of the semester, we're going straight to someone who lived the long version. Chancellor Nizar Somji founded Matrikon as a one-person venture in 1988, out of research done at the U of A. He spent the next 22 years building it into a global operation before navigating it to a successful exit when Honeywell acquired the company in 2010 for 9 figures.

​This session is for anyone who's ever wondered what that path actually looks like day to day: the academia-to-spin-out transition, the time spent building, and the deal that closes it out. If you're a student, researcher or academic looking at entrepreneurship as an option, this is proof the path is real, and the journey can be worth it.