Cat’s Track #170 – Monique Simair

Welcome to Cat’s Track Episode 170, with guest Monique Simair.

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Monique has a passion for building things, usually unconventionally by sticking to her belief that we should figure out what works and not just keep repeating what is considered normal. Always at the forefront of business and systems innovation Dr. Simair has become recognized internationally as a disruptive technology innovator. A PhD biogeochemist by training, she graduated to an economy with few jobs and too many graduates. She formed her first company in 2010 without business training, taking a scientific approach of viewing business systems as biological organisms – living, evolving, and growing. From her unconventional approach several international biotechnology firsts have arisen, as well as new approaches to business sustainability that are now being adopted by others. Dr. Simair has been named by Profit Magazine as one of Canada’s future entrepreneurial leaders, to Chatelaine’s W100 women entrepreneurs, and was the youngest person ever appointed by the federal government to serve as an advisor through the science, technology, and innovation council of Canada. Monique is one of fewer than 2% of female entrepreneurs who have broken the million dollar annual revenue barrier and has done this twice now in the environmental tech sector.

For the past decade Dr. Simair has been revolutionizing water treatment around the world, resulting in her former company (Contango Strategies) being acquired in a multimillion dollar acquisition. Now she is tackling new business sustainability, environmental, and technical challenges with Maven Water & Environment, which she founded in 2019 and is a high growth enviro-tech company based in Saskatoon.