Tiffany and Rodrigo Rezende – Atoms Integrator
It was a Sunday during the 2018 World Cup season.
On Tiffany and Rodrigo Rezende’s backyard lawn, 72 members of Waterloo Region’s Brazilian community gathered to watch Brazil battle Switzerland on two big screens. Kids played soccer and adults sipped caipirinha as the mouth-watering smell of sizzling steak, chicken and pork drifted through the hazy summer air.
Later that evening, as marshmallows browned over a crackling bonfire, Alex Price sang a few tunes. The artist behind Love in LA is a close family friend.
For the co-founders of Atoms Integrator, it was a larger than usual gathering. “To us it was a special moment, like family coming together,” says Rodrigo.
Together with Ewerton Lacerda da Silva, the company’s third and final co-founder, they have a mission: to identify bright ideas from around the world, help them grow to their full potential, and connect them with countries where they’re needed most.
But it all started out with the community they hosted that Sunday.
It didn’t form right away. In fact, it didn’t exist when Rodrigo moved to Canada at 16. His dad was already living in the country. “I learned about Canada from my dad’s experience,” he says. “The challenge at the time was the language barrier. There were no Brazilians here at all.”
When he met Tiffany, she helped bridge that gap. “She was like my English teacher. We ended up getting married and I went into my career.” (Rodrigo is a home builder too, by the way.)
Tiffany wanted to learn Portuguese herself – she could speak a little, but just not enough. So she signed up for a class in Cambridge.
Her first teacher taught very proper language from Portugal, she says, but left the class partway through the lessons. Then Elini, the new teacher, arrived. She was all about teaching Brazilian Portuguese.
Soon, they weren’t just meeting in class. “We started hanging out on the weekends,” Tiffany remembers, and then she connected the Rezendes to a few more Brazilians in the community.
Elini also introduced them to Ewerton, then a Latin America recruiter for Conestoga College, who was sharing a homestay accommodation with her.
“He grew up in the slums of Brazil,” says Rodrigo, but because of his grades through school, he had the opportunity to study in Canada. “He was so grateful for what Canada had given him and his journey helping others enter the ecosystem.”
Since then the community has grown, and the Rezendes’ home is more than just a home. “It’s an unofficial community centre,” Tiffany says.
They also started noticing something interesting at their gatherings.
“Some of them always wanted to open a business,” says Rodrigo, and the ideas they shared were great. They were curious about how to become entrepreneurs. “The biggest challenge they were having is understanding the culture.”
Even with the best idea, entering a new culture is hard, which is why Atoms Integrator aims to make the transition smoother. And they’re starting right here, in Canada.
Not only do they organize entrepreneurial tour groups around Ontario’s tech sector – especially in Kitchener-Waterloo-Cambridge – but they also provide access to cross-cultural training specifically designed to prepare international founders for business in Canada. They’re even building a digital platform for cross-cultural education and problem solving as they partner with incubators and universities around the world.
“For us, the most gratifying part is the education. We’ve listened to entrepreneurs, trying to bring an education that works,” says Rodrigo.
Their own experiences starting Atoms Integrator in Canada fuels their desire to share it with others, too.
First, living here made them feel comfortable becoming entrepreneurs themselves. “In my view I felt very safe, like I could take a chance on my own to build a company of my own,” he says.
It meant sharing Canada’s talent with the rest of the world. As the Canadian organizer of Creative Business Week and the Creative Business Cup, an international pitch competition for creative businesses, they hope to showcase great ideas from the Great White North on the international stage.
And it meant looking at what being in Canada really means for international entrepreneurs –including those from Brazil, like Rodrigo and Ewerton. “It’s so hard for them to succeed. They know that a simple government change means different types of laws will happen,” he says.
“They want to be international because they might be comfortable in Brazil, but the country is very unstable.”
For Tiffany, who was born in Canada, it’s given her a chance to reflect as well. When they talk to Canadians about what it’s like living here, they get a lot of answers like “maple syrup” and “the Leafs.” But ask someone who immigrated here, and “the answer I’ll get is safety, quality of life. That’s what they value the most.”
That’s a pretty important factor when it comes to fostering innovation that doesn’t just survive, but thrives. Acknowledging that great ideas can come from anywhere is the Atoms Integrator modus operandi.
Or, as Tiffany puts it: “An atom by itself is nothing, but together they build something great.”
Learn more at:
www.atomsintegrator.com