Trung Pham

The Schulich Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship congratulates RYSE’s hardworking team for raising over $2M USD in their ongoing Series A Community Round so far. RYSE is employing a unique investment vehicle that allows both accredited and retail investors to participate in their funding round.

RYSE’s founder, Trung Pham (BBA, ’09), credits Schulich for his understanding the importance of a financial model as an entrepreneur.

“Schulich helped me from a financial and accounting perspective, specifically to really understand potential drivers of growth and their contribution to top-line revenues,” said Pham. “You really need to build a financial model from the bottom-up to understand what drives your revenues. For us, we have multiple channels that contribute to growth, including ecommerce, retail and wholesale/B2B.”

RYSE Inc. is a global provider of technology that helps solve the problem of wasted energy in homes and buildings by automating window shades. Their solutions provide comfort and convenience to the masses and independent living to the growing aging population and the disabled.

A Schulich Startups ecosystem company, RYSE is a PropTech IoT startup that has generated over $6M in revenues to date, securing partnerships with major retailers like Bed Bath & Beyond and Best Buy. RYSE’s noteworthy list of investors includes high-profile entrepreneurs Shawn Dougherty (co-founded mophie, sold for $100 Million), and Anthony Lacavera (founder of Wind Mobile, sold for $1.16 Billion).

“We expect that RYSE will in time become synonymous with smart shades, in the same way Nest is to thermostats and Ring is to doorbells,” said Pham.