The special Startups of The Year 2024 Winners Interview series is a celebration of all this year’s Tech Champions. You’ve earned it! The HackerNoon community can’t wait to learn more about your journey! The special Startups of The Year 2024 Winners Interview series is a celebration of all this year’s Tech Champions. You’ve earned it! The HackerNoon community can’t wait to learn more about your journey! The special Startups of The Year 2024 Winners Interview series is a celebration of all this year’s Tech Champions. You’ve earned it! The HackerNoon community can’t wait to learn more about your journey! Share the link to your Winning City Award/Winning Industry Award here https://hackernoon.com/startups/north-america/north-america-waterloo-canada Share the link to your Winning City Award/Winning Industry Award here https://hackernoon.com/startups/north-america/north-america-waterloo-canada https://hackernoon.com/startups/north-america/north-america-waterloo-canada Tell us about you. AIM Robotics is a Canadian startup building the future of safe and smart drone operations. Our mission is to simplify compliance, enhance safety, and accelerate innovation in the skies. We started with a clear problem: drone pilots - especially first responders—need better tools to fly legally, safely, and efficiently. Our vision is to build the digital infrastructure for low-altitude airspace, starting in Canada and expanding globally. Tell us how your startup is changing the world. We started by solving compliance, a pain point every pilot faces before takeoff. Our flagship platform RPAS WILCO helps drone operators manage pre-flight planning, in-flight compliance, and post-flight logging - all in one place. We’re trusted by over twenty thousands of certified pilots, government agencies, and Fortune 500s. By helping people fly safely, we’re unlocking the real potential of drones—for emergency response, inspections, agriculture, and beyond. What sets you apart from the competition? We lead with trust and practicality. We’re the only drone tech company in Canada authorized by NAV Canada to distribute aeronautical data. We built the country’s largest Flight Reviewer Network. And we’ve helped shape safety protocols with airports and first responders. Our secret? We listen. Every feature we’ve built comes from direct conversations with real users. We focus on doing one thing better than anyone else - making drones easier and safer to use. What does it mean for you to win this title? It’s a proud moment for us. Startups are hard. Most of the time you’re so deep in the work, you forget to come up for air. Being named Startup of the Year in Waterloo - one of Canada’s most innovative tech hubs means a lot. It’s a reminder that what we’re building matters and that people are watching. We’re grateful and more motivated than ever. What do you love about your team, and why are you the ones to set out for this mission? Our team is scrappy, driven, and mission-first. We come from diverse backgrounds - aviation, software, emergency services, but we’re united by the belief that technology can save lives and make airspace safer. We’re obsessed with user feedback and we ship fast. Everyone here wears multiple hats, and there’s zero ego. That’s how we move quickly, stay focused, and keep learning. Looking back, what milestone was the biggest turning point for your startup? Onboarding our first Fortune 500 enterprise client was a game-changer. It validated everything we’d built up to that point - from compliance tools to our support workflows. It forced us to level up our security, our scale, and our service mindset. More importantly, it showed us that big players were ready to bet on our platform to manage mission-critical operations. That’s when we knew we were onto something real. What’s one valuable lesson you learned this year that you’d pass on to other startups? Focus on the product and the value it delivers. Be honest and sincere with your clients. It’s easy to chase revenue, but when you truly solve a problem and support your customers with integrity, the revenue follows naturally. 2024 reminded us to cut the noise and stay true to what we’re building. How do you envision your industry evolving in the coming years, and how will your startup stay ahead? Drones are going from hobbyist toys to essential infrastructure. In the next few years, we’ll see more automation, tighter regulations, and deeper integration into urban and industrial workflows. Our job is to be the connective tissue - helping people navigate complexity with clarity. We’ll stay ahead by staying humble, staying fast, and staying close to the front lines of drone operations. How do you or your company intend to embrace the responsibility of this title in 2025? Being named Startup of the Year is an opportunity to lead by example. We plan to share more of what we’ve learned, mentor other early-stage founders in the region, and collaborate more openly with the broader drone and aviation communities. We want to use this platform to advocate for safer skies and smarter tech policy. What goals are you looking forward to accomplishing in 2025? The new Transport Canada regulations are actually doing us a huge favour. Flight planning software is now mandatory for compliant operations - and RPAS WILCO is the only platform that fully meets these requirements. We’re going into full offence mode in 2025 to expand our footprint across Canada, helping more pilots, businesses, and government agencies stay compliant and fly safer. 2024 has been crazy, with all the new techs, and all the geopolitics fluctuations. What are the impacts of these to your startup, and to your industry as a whole? Be as brief or as detailed as you like. AI has completely changed the game in 2024. It’s not just about adding smarter features - it’s forcing every company, including ours, to rethink the entire solution. What do users really need? What can be automated, predicted, or made safer with intelligence? In the drone space, AI lets us optimize flight paths, detect risks, and deliver real-time insights that were never possible before. It’s a massive shift from tool-building to system-thinking. For us, it’s not just an upgrade—it’s a re-imagination of how we serve pilots, regulators, and the public. We would love your feedback on HackerNoon as a tech publication! How has your experience been with us? HackerNoon has always been a great community for makers and technologists. It’s one of the few platforms that still values substance over hype. This award program is a great example - highlighting real startups doing meaningful work. We’re thankful to be part of it. Any words of wisdom you’d like to share with us? Focus beats brilliance. You don’t need to do everything. You need to do one thing exceptionally well and let your users lead the way. Oh -and celebrate the wins, even the small ones. They keep you going. About HackerNoon’s Startups of The Year Startups of The Year 2024 is HackerNoon’s flagship community-driven event celebrating startups, technology, and the spirit of innovation. Currently in its third iteration, the prestigious Internet award recognizes and celebrates tech startups of all shapes and sizes. This year, over 150,000 entities across 4200+ cities, 6 continents, and 100+ industries will participate in a bid to be crowned the best startup of the year! Millions of votes have been cast over the past few years, and many stories have been written about these daring and rising startups. The winners will get a free interview on HackerNoon and an Evergreen Tech Company Newspage.Visit our FAQ page to learn more. Download our design assets here.Check out the Startups of the Year Merch Shop here.HackerNoon’s Startups of The Year is a branding opportunity unlike any other. Whether your goal is brand awareness or lead generation, HackerNoon has curated startup-friendly packages to solve your marketing challenges. Meet our sponsors: Wellfound:. Join the #1 global, startup-focused community. At Wellfound, we're not just a job board—we're the place where top startup talent and the world's most exciting companies connect to build the future. Notion: Notion is trusted and loved by thousands of startups as their connected workspace—from building product roadmaps to tracking fundraising. Try Notion with unlimited AI, FREE for up to 6 months, to build and scale your company with one powerful tool. Get your offer now! Hubspot: If you’re looking for a smart CRM platform that meets the needs of small businesses, look no further than HubSpot. Seamlessly connect your data, teams and customers in one easy-to-use scalable platform that grows with your business. Get started for free.Bright Data: Startups that leverage public web data can make faster, data-driven decisions, giving them a competitive edge. With Bright Data’s scalable web data collection, businesses can grow from a small operation to an enterprise by harnessing insights at every stage. Algolia: Algolia NeuralSearch is the world's only AI end-to-end Search and Discovery Platform combining powerful keyword and natural language processing in a single API. About HackerNoon’s Startups of The Year Startups of The Year 2024 is HackerNoon’s flagship community-driven event celebrating startups, technology, and the spirit of innovation. Currently in its third iteration, the prestigious Internet award recognizes and celebrates tech startups of all shapes and sizes. This year, over 150,000 entities across 4200+ cities, 6 continents, and 100+ industries will participate in a bid to be crowned the best startup of the year! Millions of votes have been cast over the past few years, and many stories have been written about these daring and rising startups. Startups of The Year 2024 many stories The winners will get a free interview on HackerNoon and an Evergreen Tech Company Newspage. free interview Evergreen Tech Company Newspage Visit our FAQ page to learn more. FAQ Download our design assets here. here Check out the Startups of the Year Merch Shop here. here HackerNoon’s Startups of The Year is a branding opportunity unlike any other. Whether your goal is brand awareness or lead generation, HackerNoon has curated startup-friendly packages to solve your marketing challenges. startup-friendly packages Meet our sponsors: Meet our sponsors: Wellfound:. Join the #1 global, startup-focused community. At Wellfound, we're not just a job board—we're the place where top startup talent and the world's most exciting companies connect to build the future. Wellfound: Join the #1 global, startup-focused community Notion: Notion is trusted and loved by thousands of startups as their connected workspace—from building product roadmaps to tracking fundraising. Try Notion with unlimited AI, FREE for up to 6 months, to build and scale your company with one powerful tool. Get your offer now! Notion: Try Notion with unlimited AI, FREE for up to 6 months Get your offer now ! Hubspot: If you’re looking for a smart CRM platform that meets the needs of small businesses, look no further than HubSpot. Seamlessly connect your data, teams and customers in one easy-to-use scalable platform that grows with your business. Get started for free. Hubspot: Get started for free Bright Data: Startups that leverage public web data can make faster, data-driven decisions, giving them a competitive edge. With Bright Data’s scalable web data collection, businesses can grow from a small operation to an enterprise by harnessing insights at every stage. Bright Data: Bright Data’s scalable web data collection Algolia: Algolia NeuralSearch is the world's only AI end-to-end Search and Discovery Platform combining powerful keyword and natural language processing in a single API. Algolia: AI end-to-end Search and Discovery Platform
