St. John’s, NL, Canada – St. John’s-based, trophi.ai, has become one of only a few Canadian tech companies to be accepted into SPEEDRUN, A16Z GAMES’ startup program. The intensive 12-week program provides access to capital, expert guidance, and an influential community. The program concludes with a Demo Day, where trophi.ai will pitch to leading global investors.
“It's a tremendous moment in trophi.ai’s journey,” explains Co-Founder and CEO, Mike Winter, who launched the startup in December 2021. “The magnitude of this opportunity is difficult to describe - only 1% of applicants are accepted into the SPEEDRUN startup program.”
trophi.ai’s acceptance in the program is tied to its artificial intelligence (AI)-driven platform that provides tailored, interactive, one-to-one, coaching in real time to gamers and traditional athletes. It is turning heads in the tech world; trophi.ai estimates the software provided the equivalent volume of 125 years of elite-coaching in just 6 months.
Today, that coaching is focused on video games and simulation, but it has the potential to revolutionize the way skills are honed and goals are pursued across any field.
“Our AI-driven platform is not just an enhancement—it's a complete reinvention of the coaching experience. There is no doubt the successful application of our platform to-date was a critical factor in our acceptance into the program,” Winter added. “But we believe the biggest factor is our vision for the future – we have every intention of expanding this technology beyond virtual environments to tangible settings like real-world sports, industrial environments, and military applications.”
Winter, who moved back to St. John’s to launch trophi.ai, praises the supportive environment for tech startups in Newfoundland and Labrador as an important contributor to the company’s success to-date. trophi.ai has received funding and support from the provincial government department of Industry, Energy and Technology (IET), as well as federal government departments Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency (ACOA) and National Research Council of Canada Industrial Research Assistance Program.
More details on A16Z GAMES is available on its website. Information specific to the SPEEDRUN startup program Winter 2025 cohort is available here.
Media Contact
Sarah Fleming
sarah@covepublicaffairs.ca I 709-725-5830
About trophi.ai
trophi.ai is bringing artificial intelligence-powered elite-level coaching to gamers, traditional athletes, industrial activities and more around the world. trophi.ai estimates the volume of real-time coaching provided by the platform in a 6-month period would take over 125 years for a human coach to provide.
Headquartered in St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada, trophi.ai has a team of 22 experts in artificial intelligence and start-up tech, including, software programming, data science, and marketing, with a plan to double its team by the end of 2025.
About trophi.ai Co-Founders
CEO and Co-Founder, Mike Winter was born and raised in St. John’s, NL, and graduated from Memorial University of Newfoundland before working in tech startups in Ontario, the United States, and Vancouver. He returned home to Newfoundland in 2021 to establish trophi.ai.
ST. JOHN’S, NL - Artificial intelligence coaching startup trophi.ai is on track to triple its talent team after raising $3.3Million in venture capital funding for its platform, which uses AI to bring elite personal coaching to virtual motorsportracers and gamers around the world.
“Our platform has the potential to give gamers and athletes a competitive edge at every level, by providing personal, AI-based coaching to weekend warriors, high performance gamers and real-world elite athletes,” said trophi.ai founder Mike Winter. “Together, we are building a new model for coaching that will change how the world thinks about sports. We expect the next generation of champions will be trained on our platform.”
The investment is among the largest ever seed financing rounds for a St. John’s-based tech firm, and comes only 16 months after Winter returned to Newfoundland to launch the company in December 2021.
The funding was led by venture capital fund Build Ventures, supported by Concrete Ventures, and an international collection of angel investors.
The startup expects to hire 10-15 staff for its new downtown office by Summer 2023, including software developers, data scientists, product managers, game designers and marketing talent with plans to expand to a full staff complement of 40 in 2025.
The trophi.ai platform, built by a team of local software developers from its office in St. John’s, rapidly attracted 10,000 users following its alpha launch and is on a path to 100,000 users by 2024.
Build Ventures’ General Partner Patrick Keefe says the investment reflects his firm’s confidence in trophi.ai’s strong leadership team and technical expertise.
“In a short period of time, trophi.ai has made impressive progress with their technology. We see AI coaching as a rapidly growing high potential market and we are excited to support trophi.ai as they expand their team in Newfoundland,” Keefe said.
Winter was born and raised in St. John’s, and graduated from Memorial University of Newfoundland before working intech startups in Ontario, the United States, and Vancouver. He returned home to Newfoundland in 2021 to establish trophi.ai with co-founder Scott Mansell, a UK-based former professional racing driver and top youtube Formula 1 influencer who operates the successful coaching and driver training company Driver61.
Winter says that experience helped him see the potential for AI coaching for everyone, leading him to launch trophi.ai and create opportunities for local talent in his hometown.
“We’re building a world class team here in St. John’s,” he said. “AI is an exciting and rapidly evolving field of innovation and we are thrilled to help Newfoundland become a leader in this space.”
Headquartered in St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador, trophi.ai is bringing artificial intelligence-powered elite-level coaching to gamers and traditional athletes around the world. Find out more and join our team at trophi.ai.
Media Enquiries: Mike Winter
Co-founder and CEO
trophi.ai mike@trophi.ai
