CIE: Seek Your Own Proof

"Education of an entrepreneur" article

2009-04-20T23:06:00.000-07:00

Was fortunate to get some front page action in the Business section of the Edmonton Journal recently. It was a follow up article related to the speech I gave at the incubator event. I was surprised to find out a few weeks later that the article went national and ran in the Montreal Gazette, Vancouver Province, Calgary Herald and Regina Leader Post! It was great exposure for our company and project, and I was glad I could share our experiences with other entrepreneurs around the country! My parents would be proud.

Mission 1 Release

2009-03-20T21:36:00.000-07:00

We've just released the first mission in CIE entitled, "Secret Codes of the Keymaker". As the newest agents of the CIE begin to piece together the agency's history, they discover an individual known only as "The Keymaker", whose bizarre obsession with codes have kept authorities puzzled for years. It's a free mission for everyone to try, so check it out today!

Fortune Hunters 8 seconds of fame

2009-02-15T21:58:00.000-08:00

We had 8 seconds(!) of fame yesterday when we were featured in the Trend Trackers segment of CBC's Fortune Hunters. The episode was entitled "The Facebook Factor" and highlighted several social media start-ups across Canada. Check out the whole episode at the Fortune Hunters website (look for episode 6).

New poster art

2008-12-15T16:37:00.000-08:00

Check out our new poster art. Thanks to the folks at RED, in particular Fernando for his wicked work on our "octogirl".

Canadian interactive firms continue to make their mark with kids content

2008-03-20T16:28:00.000-07:00

By Kurt Eby, Canadian New Media, March 20, 2008 - BC-based New Horizon Interactive set the gold standard for kids online entertainment when it launched the social networking site Club Penguin in 2005, which it sold to The Walt Disney Co. last August for US$350 million. Now another western-Canadian new media firm is gaining national and international recognition for what may be the next big thing in kids interactive entertainment.

Last month Edmonton-based Hotrocket beat out 20 other digital media companies to be named “Best of Show” at the 2008 Fusion Digital Media Venture Forum in Vancouver for its kids cross-platform game CIE. The award comes a year after Hotrocket won “Best Pitch” and CIE was named “Best Property” at the KidScreen Summit in New York City. For winning at Fusion Digital, Hotrocket now has the opportunity to travel to Seattle and Silicon Valley for follow up meetings with groups of top-tier venture capital firms over the next month.

“CIE is a project we’ve been working on for the last 2 years and now what we’re looking for is our next round of financing,” says Hotrocket CEO Ken Bautista. “What we presented at the Fusion Forum was to kind of get us to the next stage. Our goal is to see if we can get something locked in, so we can hopefully launch sometime in early 2009.” And when the rubber hits the road Hotrocket will find out for sure if its game will live up to the expectations of the concept.

Designed for kids aged eight to 12, CIE, or the Central Institute for Exploration, “follows the inner workings of a secret kids-only agency dedicated to exploring the past, present and future.” The story line is delivered through cell phones, websites, blogs, podcasts and video, and kids have to work together to solve the games issues and challenges.

While the launch of the truly multi-platform CIE may change the face of kids gaming, it will definitely change the business direction of Hotrocket. Co-founded in 2001 by Bautista and Jason Suriano, Hotrocket primarily focused on interactive consulting and strategy until the last couple of years when it moved more into developing original intellectual property. Bautista says now that he’s about to turn 30, he believes Hotrocket is entering its second act where it will primarily focus on original IP in the kids genre. Both the business model and the market, he says, provide the most opportunity for the company.

However, Bautista and Suriano aren’t specializing in the kids market just to chase Club Penguin-type money. In fact, they both are naturals for the genre; Bautista’s Bachelors degree from the University of Alberta is in Elementary Education and Suriano used to be an elementary school teacher. And for creative professionals, kids present an almost limitless demographic.

“The nice thing about the eight-to-12 demographic is it’s a fun age,” says Bautista. “They’re kind of the first generation born into the interactive age. So email is mail for them. They are well informed on new platforms, so we can do a lot of pretty cool things, whereas with adult content the demographic is still growing into some of the new interactive technology.”

The media savvy of kids fits perfectly with Hotrocket’s branded storytelling approach, 360 Degree Play, which engages kids across all platforms, wherever they are. It’s an approach the firm has brought to other clients through its consulting business, and is also obviously employing through CIE. “Kids are the generation that really has that multiplatform aspect to them and is used to consuming media in multiple ways,” says Bautista.

The other advantage of developing kids content is the opportunity to grow with your audience, and Hotrocket has been looking at some older kid and teenage interactive properties. For now, though, much of the focus will be on bringing CIE to market. Bautista says Hotrocket has already arranged partnerships with Canadian science centres and museums to spread CIE, and has had discussions with a number of media companies that have shown interest as well. But will Hotrocket be the next western-Canadian interactive firm to catch fire with a kids property? Only time will tell.

CIE wins at Fusion Digital Media Venture Forum and Alberta Business Awards

2008-03-10T16:28:00.000-07:00

Hotrocket, the international award-winning Alberta interactive production company, has made its mark at two high profile events in Western Canada. In February, the company was named “Best of Show” at the 2008 Fusion Digital Media Venture Forum in Vancouver, beating out 20 of Canada’s hottest digital media companies. Later that month, the company picked up another win, recognized with the Marketing Award of Distinction at the 2008 Alberta Business Awards in Calgary.

“It’s been an amazing month,” said Ken Bautista, 30, CEO of Hotrocket, who started his most recent road trip in New York at the 2008 KidScreen Summit, where they won the international pitch competition the previous year. “We got great exposure after last year’s win for our cross-platform kids game CIE, so we had a busy week of meetings in the Big Apple with new projects, clients and production partners.”

After KidScreen, Bautista flew to San Francisco for meetings at the Game Developers Conference with business partner Jason Suriano, and then headed to Vancouver to pitch at the Fusion Forum. Explains Bautista, “Fusion is the only financing event in the west dedicated to digital media, so we were excited to have the opportunity to pitch to investors from Vancouver, Seattle and Silicon Valley very familiar with the digital entertainment space.” After an 8-minute pitch, and a barrage of questions, the judging investors awarded Hotrocket with first prize. As a result of this recognition, Hotrocket will have the opportunity to travel to Seattle and Silicon Valley for follow up meetings with groups of top-tier venture capital firms over the next month.

Shortly after, Bautista headed to Calgary as a finalist for the Marketing Award of Distinction at the Alberta Business Awards gala event (hosted by the Alberta Chambers of Commerce). Up against stiff competition from Micralyne (Edmonton), Calgary Public Library, and Community Savings (Red Deer), Hotrocket won the award, which was presented by Ruth Kelly from Alberta Venture. Asked about the highlight of the night, Bautista replied, “Being personally congratulated for our achievements by Premier Ed Stelmach was a pretty sweet highlight and a great honor.”

About the Fusion Digital Media Venture Forum

The Fusion Digital Media Venture Forum is the only financing event in the west dedicated to new digital media ventures. Fusion is designed to highlight the hottest digital media companies, provide valuable insights into key issues in the industry, and provide a premium networking opportunity as well as a chance to learn from world-class investment professionals involved in the sector. Along with presentations from Canada’s rising stars in the digital media sector, event highlights include keynotes, a panel presentation, industry case study, and networking mixers. The forum takes place at the Vancouver International Film Centre, and is supported by Telefilm Canada and the National Research Council Canada. www.thefusionforum.com

About the Alberta Business Awards of Distinction

The Alberta Business Awards of Distinction are the most prestigious business awards presented in Alberta each year. This year, the 46 finalists for the 2008 Alberta Business Awards of Distinction are thriving in today’s energized economy because they seize opportunities and adapt their practices to meet challenges. The Alberta Chambers of Commerce hosts its annual awards program to recognize this pioneering spirit in our province’s business community. www.abbusinessawards.ab.ca

Alberta Venture: Life Imitating Art

2007-04-10T12:07:00.000-07:00

CIE Wins Pitch It! at KidScreen 2007

2007-02-20T16:27:00.000-08:00

February 20, 2007 - We recently got back from the eighth annual Kidscreen Summit in New York City, the premiere event for executives in the children’s entertainment industry. It was another fantastic event, with great sessions and activity, which we’ll be posting more about soon. But we also wanted to write about the Pitch It! event that was held at the end of the 3-day summit… we pitched CIE… and won!

The official Pitch It! description: “Watch as brave producers take center stage to pitch their projects for boys ages six to 10 to our distinguished panel of judges (not to mention a room full of other potential buyers, licensees, retailers, distributors and co-production partners). The Summit ends with a bang as votes are cast based on the merit of the project AND the quality of the pitch.”

Intimidating? Yup. I knew what to expect watching other producers pitch at the big event the last few years at Kidscreen. But it was still nerve-racking to think about pitching in front of over 1,300 executives from the children’s entertainment industry AND to a panel of senior executives who included John Rooney (YTV Corus Entertainment), Sebastian Debertin (KI.KA), Howard Litton (Nickelodeon UK), Bob Higgins (Cartoon Network), and David Levine (Disney).

We found out we were one of only four producers to be selected to pitch in the competition a mere two weeks before the event. So we hustled to get ready.

I just wanted to pitch on the first day of Kidscreen, but I had all week to think about it instead. So I used the time to pitch it to Jason, fellow Albertans (who were at Kidscreen too), and other people we met with during the conference.

Six minutes isn’t a long time. We were also dealing with a property that wasn’t your typical broadcast series. We had online, mobile, real world locations, and broadcast mixed into a single entertainment experience for our 8-12 demographic. We had some interesting (and risky) things planned for the pitch (planting a clue under a judge’s chair, having my computer crash, getting phone calls), all which could have gone either way.

But in the end, doing these things as part of our pitch made it a lot more memorable and helped to communicate the spirit of our project to the audience (and to the judges). And so we won in both categories - pitch quality and project viability. We won a bunch of stuff - a full page ad in Kidscreen Magazine, a full pass for next year’s Kidscreen, a tween research report (awesome), and, most importantly, more exposure for our project as we get closer to our launch.

Some final shout outs are in order… Congrats to my fellow pitchers, John Rice (Jam Media), Ciara Breslin (Busy Ant Productions), and Paul Shuttleworth (Handle and Spout), who all had wonderful projects to pitch. To team Hotrocket without whom this pitch would not have come together. To my wife who heard the pitch over and over and over again. And finally to Molly and Naomi Brierley for lending their voices and faces to add that final piece that would make our pitch a winner!

Rewriting the Rules at KidScreen

2007-02-19T16:26:00.000-08:00

February 19, 2007 - Playback Magazine (Written by Lianne Stewart): The eighth annual KidScreen Summit was ablaze with activity, literally, as 1,367 executives from the children’s entertainment world converged in New York last week to analyze the future of the industry and, on day one, to flee an electrical fire and flood in the Sheraton Hotel & Towers.

And although the mishap elicited many conversations, multiplatform strategies were top of mind for most delegates this year.

Donna MacNeil, KidScreen’s VP and group publisher, says panels that focused on working in the nonlinear environment were teeming with attendees looking for hints on how to use new media effectively.

“People weren’t necessarily looking at how to create content, but rather how to use it as a marketing tool,” she says.

Andrew Lane, brand development manager at prodco marblemedia, says the conference illustrated the need for the industry to rewrite the rules. He points to Taking the Retail Reins, a panel that looked at the exclusive Doodlebops licence agreement between Montreal’s Cookie Jar and online retailer Ty’s Toy Box.

“It wasn’t traditional and they didn’t have the metrics to say it would work, but they took a gamble and it paid off, and that was a theme for many of the panels this year,” Lane says.

Navigating uncharted new media played into the summit’s final event, Pitch It -where pre-selected producers had six minutes to present their property to a panel of broadcasters.

Alberta-based producer Rocketfuel captured the event’s top gong with the TV property C.I.E. The toon, geared for eight- to 12-year-olds, centers on a group of online detectives who use hidden access codes to solve mysteries.

Jocelyn Christie, editor of KidScreen magazine, says it was the first year in which all of the pitches included strong multiplatform supports. But MacNeil adds that some of the broadcast judges warned producers some properties swing too much to new media and less on how it would work on television.

Next up is the KidScreen West summit, May 14-15 in Santa Monica, CA, where the panels will focus on licensing, marketing and consumer product strategies for children’s entertainment. Both events are organized by KidScreen magazine, which is owned by Playback’s parent company Brunico Communications.

Canadian Film Centre Announces First Two Recipients of the TELUS Innovation Fund

2007-01-15T16:22:00.000-08:00

TORONTO, January 15, 2007 – The Canadian Film Centre is pleased to announce the first two recipients of the newly formed TELUS Innovation Fund. Rocketfuel Productions [a joint venture between Hotrocket and Redengine], and Films Isle Turbulent Inc., will each receive funding of $100,000 to put towards completing their original and ground-breaking media-based projects.

Created and administered by the Canadian Film Centre, the TELUS Innovation Fund was established through the financial support of TELUS, to foster a culture of excellence and creativity in Canada’s film, TV and new media industries. Launched in January of 2006, the fund was designed to assist projects that explore new ways of approaching entertainment and storytelling; placing Canadian ideas, talent, and media at the forefront.

Selected from a formidable field of 65 initial applicants, thirteen companies were subsequently asked to present full applications. The wide variety of medium-based projects were adjudicated by a cross-Canada jury including: Charles Bishop - President/Executive Producer for Halifax Films (Halifax), Steve Billinger - Executive Director, Digital Programming & Business Development, CBC (Toronto), and Carol Parnell - co-founder of Ecotype.ca and National Director of Education for the Wired Woman organization (Vancouver).The proposals submitted by Rocketfuel Productions, and Films Isle Turbulent Inc., were chosen for their exceptional projects; each of which promise to pioneer original Canadian Content that will reach a general public audience.

The TELUS Innovation Fund will support up to three projects a year to a maximum of $100,000 per project. The 2007 application deadline has been extended to Monday, February 19th. For further information on the TELUS Innovation Fund guidelines or to complete the preliminary application form, please visit www.cfccreates.com.

ABOUT TELUS
TELUS (TSX: T, T.NV; NYSE: TU) is the largest telecommunications company in Western Canada and the second largest in the country, with $8.0 billion of annual revenue, 4.7 million network access lines and 4.3 million wireless customers. The company provides customers with a full range of telecommunications products and services including data, voice and wireless services across Canada, utilizing next generation Internet-based technologies. For more information about TELUS, please visit www.telus.com

ABOUT THE CFC
The CFC is Canada’s largest institution for advanced training in film, television and new media. A leader in the rapidly changing entertainment landscape, the CFC is committed to promoting and investing in Canada’s diverse talent; providing exhibition, financial, and distribution opportunities for top creative content leaders from coast to coast. The CFC makes a significant cultural and economic contribution to Canada by launching the country’s most creative ideas and voices in film, television and new media to the world. For more information please visit: www.cfccreates.com .

Winning Most Promising Company at the Canadian New Media Awards

2006-05-30T16:19:00.000-07:00

It’s official. Rocketfuel Productions [a joint venture between Hotrocket and Redengine] was named the Most Promising New Company of the Year at the 2006 Canadian New Media Awards. At a gala awards ceremony held at the Carlu in Toronto Monday night, we were one of 15 winners out of 43 national finalists to be presented a prestigious Pixel award. The ceremony was hosted by Alan Park (of CBC Royal Canadian Air Farce fame) live in front of an audience of over 500 industry members and guests from across the country.

We were so honored and thrilled to be recognized by our peers with this award. It capped off an amazing two days in (blistering hot) Toronto that included an excellent BBQ reception hosted at the Canadian Film Centre on Bayview Drive, and a luncheon hosted by RBC (in their executive dining room), featuring the Honourable Bev Oda, Minister of Canadian Heritage, Kerry Munro, General Manager of Yahoo! Canada, and RBC Vice President Joanne Gordon. Kudos to the team at CNMA including Founder/Exec Producer Adam Froman, Tannis Wengel, and Jacquie Sands for delivering such a great experience.

During this short time, I met many exceptionally creative and talented people from across the Canadian new media industry. The representation at this year’s event absolutely shows that Canada’s new media industry is alive and growing. I got to know many of our fellow finalists who I’m sure we’ll encounter again soon! A special shout-out goes to our Vancouver pal Robert Scales at Raincity Studios, who also took home a Pixel in the Graduate of the Year category. It was great hanging with his rockstar marketing agent Megan Cole, who was sent to pick up the award in his absence (Rob’s in China at the moment).

Special thanks definitely need to go out to our supporters and project partners including the Royal Tyrrell Museum, the Banff New Media Institute, Telefilm Canada and the teams at both Hotrocket and Redengine, who all helped to kickstart Rocketfuel in some way. I can’t forget the folks at the Digital Media Association of Alberta for nominating us in the first place. I think this recognition definitely means we’re onto something special together and we’re excited about what the next year has in store!

Check out all the 2006 winners and finalists here!

P.S. Did you know… the last recipients of this award have included QuickPlay Media (2005) and Ludicorp (2003), which went on to create (and sell) Flickr. That puts us into some good company! No pressure.