I want to help a BLN member who is considering incorporating a subsidiary in Canada. They are a high growth tech company selling from US into Canada at present who wishes to set up subsidiary in Canada as their sales volume increases significantly.

Canadian Flag

“We are looking to incorporate in Canada (probably BC) and are starting with a blank sheet of paper. Does anybody know any good advisors – accountants, lawyers, insurance brokers, payroll services, etc? Does anybody have any good reference material e.g. on GST, tax accounting, Canadian GAAP? Does anybody know anything about corporate structure (e.g. min number of directors, any residency requirement, min share capital, articles, filing & meetings requirements, etc) Any other thoughts, suggestions or help to get off the ground as quickly as possible? The entity we propose setting up would be for sales and marketing and a subsidiary of a UK parent.

Any thoughts welcome!”

Will put you in touch directly if you are able to help or share some of your thoughts and experiences. No doubt, beer, wine and or eternal gratitude available for any help provided.

I was sorry to see such a downbeat take on the Traveling Geeks and their visit to Cambridge from the Cambridge Evening News.

While I don’t think the panel discussion was particularly insightful to anyone that has spent time reading talking or thinking about this subject, there was lots of good to take away from the event. I know that reportage from the event has created interest in companies the geeks showcased, not just at the formal part of the event but at the informal meetings and Tweetups arranged around their trip.

GoTestIt & Timetric demo their software to the Traveling Geeks

I am not sure whether this stemmed from feeling threatened by the sheer energy of the Geeks and their views about the collapse of existing media outlets or from not knowing how to lever some of the new channels to their best advantage, or something else. Luckily, I have an opportunity to find out today.

I am going to see Jenny Chapman, the author of this article, this afternoon. I thought it would be worth understanding her perspective and perhaps even persuade her to try Twitter. Who knows, her style might lend itself quite well to the medium and she might even like it.

Deloitte’s Flagship Fast 50 Awards programme is launching the Green15, a new award for the UK’s leading GreenTech (Cleantech) companies. This runs alongside the existing national and global Fast 50 programme.

Where Eagles Dare

The Fast 50 Awards give the UK’s grown up high growth technology companies recognition on a national and global stage and celebrate businesses that have shown revenue growth over a five year period. The Green 15 aims to give special recognition to an emerging sector where the UK has a capacity to excel on a global basis.

Many of the UK’s most respected technology companies have Fast 50 awards in their reception areas or boardrooms, although there are also significant profiling benefits. To quote the Fast 50 website:

“The press have rewarded Fast 50 winners with positive media exposure and have become increasingly interested in Fast 50 winners, related trends and overall statistics. Past years’ competitions have generated over 1,000 print articles and 25 TV and radio slots. Just a few of the interested parties include: The Financial Times, The Times, The Guardian, The Independent, The Herald, Liverpool Daily Post, Bristol Evening Post, Western Daily Press, Business in Wales, South Wales Argus, Western Mail, South Wales Evening Post, Gloucestershire Echo, Reuters, BBC, Bath Chronicle, Web TV, Computing, and IT Week”.

Entries are judged on a regional, national, continental and then global basis making this the world’s largest objectively judged business awards competitions. Winners are decided on basis of percentage increase in audited increase in revenue over time although no revenue numbers are disclosed publicly. Despite the downturn, there are over 35% more entries at this point in the competiton compared to last year.

Time will tell whether this year’s winner will match the 28,558% growth over 5 years of Thunderhead Software.

Last year’s Top Ten UK winners. Companies in the top ten were drawn from the software, hardware, service & healthcare sectors:

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More about previous winners here.

More about the awards here.

The entry form here.

Important Disclosure: Deloitte is a client of The BLN on a number of our projects and The BLN has been engaged by Deloitte to help with the administration of Fast 50 entries.

I just worked out why Silicon Valley is the greatest place on earth to be a technology company.

So the travelinggeeks (or travellinggeeks) depending on which country you are from and whether you can spell have been in the UK and it looks like they have had the kind of week that almost any sane person would dread. 11 hour flight into hot, sticky, UK, 8 hour time difference = exhausted before you start and then into full on party, meet, greet, hello, hello, goodbye, say something on stage, meet, hello, goodbye, party, hello, say something relentlessness that just goes on and on and on. And on. And everyone wants a piece of them at the endless series of events, corporate events, entrepreneur events, public sector events etc etc.

They must be exhausted.

Cambridge people can tire after one night's partying

I saw them in Cambridge today and whilst the round table was a little short on insight for anyone that has spent any time reading, listening or talking about social media one thing just blew me away about them. Every single one of them networked their way round the room better than anyone I have ever seen. Simply awesome.

When they walked into the room, they smiled at people, they actively engaged, they were friendly, they listened to people, they held out their hands to shake. They sat down in their chairs, introduced themselves to the people they were sitting next to, the people behind them, asked them what they did. They made people feel important, welcome, wanted, interesting, special, interesting. They included people in conversations – seamlessly and effortlessly.

Howard Rheingold and JD Lasica excited about Kate Stone's Novalia

If that is the norm in Silicon Valley, it is no wonder it is the most networked place and the centre (center) of the world’s innovation and technology. It makes us look like stuck up amateurs in the UK (errrm…)

A funny thing happened as a result. People talked, other people in the room talked to each other, not just the people they knew, but other people. Information was exchanged, ideas shared, people who didn’t know what each other were up to ended up agreeing to meet. Business will happen because of it.

A great networker I have known for a long time introduced me to a banker they knew today as the ‘Networking King’. I had a moment of pride until I realised that in fact, I am in a different league to these guys (and not in a way that is necessarily good for Cambridge, London or the UK). I need to learn more from the masters and mistresses.

Thanks for my first lesson:

• Meghan Asha – @meghanasha
• Renee Blodgett – @MagicSauceMedia
• Susan Bratton – @susanbratton
• Tom Foremski – @tomforemski
• Sarah Lacy – @sarahcuda
• JD Lasica – @jdlasica
• Craig Newmark – @craignewmark
• Ayelet Noff – @blonde20
• Howard Rheingold – @hrheingold
• Jeff Saperstein – www.Creatingregionalwealth.com
• Sky Schuyler – @jimsky7
• Robert Scoble – @scobleizer

No question that Cambridge is a nicer place to live. I like living in the UK. If we can fix the networking, other good stuff will follow.

The brilliant fake Steve Jobs is back with a post about why no one needs to care less about the announcement of Google’s browser OS. Hugely entertaining read but with some thought provoking points.

Secret Diary of Steve Jobs

• One of the things that makes these posts worth reading is that he usually has some intelligent things to say about the subject he covers. This one is no exception.
• The other is the comments from such industry luminaries as Vladimir Putin, Sarah Palin, Ronald Reagan, Linus Torvalds, Bill Gates and Al Gore. Rare to see real humour in blog comments.

The flip side of the argument is that Google is targeting Microsoft’s Window’s Client business represents $10 billion of annual income, over half of Microsoft’s total as this Business Insider chart shows. (Be aware that if you click on the link, you may be sent to a screen with an advert overlaying the chart that opens a link to the advertiser and when you click on the ‘close’ button, it opens another version of the advert).

Windows Operating System Income

Google hasn’t actually launched anything yet, and will not until the second half of 2010.

I think the timing of this announcement is actually more important than the announcement itself. It means Google has started to behave like an incumbent in the industry, preannouncing things years before they happen, rather than what it did in the good old days when it was an exciting, innovative business that put early versions of things up on Google Labs to see what happened. RIP innovation. Hello unnovation.