About Us

We are a group of coaches and mentors passionate about the lean business canvas model. Coming from various technical, management, operational and human resources backgrounds, we work with founders and their management teams to build their foundation for international success. Our ultimate purpose is to enable global expansion to startups that have proven their business model in their home countries.

Our Founders

Emre Akkaş

Comfortable with the uncomfortable

Emre is a seasoned entrepreneur and executive who founded Globalme, a technology services company that grew into one of British Columbia’s Top 100 Tech Companies. Under his leadership, Globalme scaled from a bootstrapped startup to a multimillion-dollar enterprise, ultimately culminating in a successful exit in 2020. Emre brings deep expertise in enterprise sales, marketing, and technology development, as well as firsthand experience in scaling founder-led ventures. Today, he dedicates his time to coaching and mentoring founders, helping them navigate the journey from early-stage startup to thriving business.

Gökhan Başaran

Partnership builder

Gokhan is an entrepreneur, mentor, and business advisor with international expertise in business development, product marketing, and startup growth. He has hands-on experience launching brands and digital products globally and has supported over 200 startups through Empowered Startups, Creative Destruction Lab West, and Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada in Vancouver. Gokhan is passionate about AI, innovation, and helping businesses scale successfully.

Our Mentors

The strength of Sea To Sky Labs comes from the combined experience of our mentors. Diverse business backgrounds can be found in many teams. However, the ethnic and cultural variety of our mentorship team provides a unique strength given the startup niche that we serve.

Carlton Chen

Angel investor, Strategic Alliances, IP Protection and Licensing Expert

Carlton is a business and employment law attorney at Kurien Ouellette LLC in West Hartford, Connecticut USA. He also is an entrepreneur, an angel investor in medical technology and life sciences companies, and a co-founder of two startups, one doing US-China cross border transactions in healthcare, and the other involved with sleep technology.

Hanna Gołota

Corporate Culture and Human Resources Champion

Hanna co-founded and grew one of Vancouver's top 100 technology companies. Her passion is building high-performing teams where every member is deeply engaged in the company's culture.

Yash Gupta

People Leader & Operations Professional

Yash is a seasoned operations professional with more than thirteen years of experience in leading large-scale operations across e-commerce, retail, transportation, manufacturing and service sectors. He is a proven people leader and has led large cross-functional teams towards organizational goals and objectives.

Dr. Chang Lu

Blockchain Researcher, Ecosystem Builder

Chang Lu is an experienced blockchain researcher, educator, Web3 venture and ecosystem builder, and commercialization strategist. He has been a co-founder/top management team member in three blockchain startups, and he manages a top blockchain research institute in Canada.