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Ryerson's new Digital Media Zone (DMZ), officially opening today, is providing Ryerson University students with the opportunity to develop their digitally based ideas into consumer products with help from mentors and industry. The facility, located at 10 Dundas St. E., is a fully wired, multidisciplinary environment with 24-hour access for participating students. The ultimate goal of this largely student-led initiative is to venture beyond R&D to marketable applications with students at the helm, running their own businesses. To celebrate the opening, the first product out of the DMZ, TeamSave.com, will be officially launched today.

"Ultimately this is about education, about young people learning how to be entrepreneurs," said President Sheldon Levy. "Students and young people are major contributors to the innovation agenda, and their ideas and energy are incredible. At a university, pure research is essential, but so is encouraging and showcasing emerging talent and connecting students and young alumni to private and public sector industry. Our goal is to keep talent and industry in Canada, rather than training our young people to work in Silicon Valley. The DMZ will be a driver in creating a digital industry hub right here in downtown Toronto."

Set against the backdrop of Canada's largest digital showroom, Yonge-Dundas Square, Ryerson students come to the DMZ to connect, collaborate and create. Although the flexible loft space, designed by Ryerson interior design students, provides the necessary physical and technological infrastructure, the real emphasis is on entrepreneurship and teaching young people how to get their ideas to market.

"The Digital Media Zone is about creating a place where young people can have the opportunity to collaborate with other innovators, mentors and industry and gain the confidence and expertise they need to launch their own businesses," said Valerie Fox, director of the Ryerson DMZ. "They already have the marketable ideas; we just give them the environment and tools to execute them successfully."

Through Students in Free Enterprise (SIFE) Ryerson, DMZ participants get entrepreneurial counselling and also learn how and where to apply for funding, an essential step in getting their ideas out the door. The whole DMZ process is integrated with StartMeUp Ryerson, a SIFE program which supports and nurtures student-led startups. Ideas make their way into the DMZ by way of the StartMeUp idea consultation and pitch session. SIFE's administrative role is one element of the "for students, by students" strategy that sets the DMZ apart.

The space is run by a steering committee which includes Rohan Sharma, SIFE president and undergraduate student in the Ted Rogers School of Business Management; Hossein Rahnama, postdoctoral student in electrical and computer engineering; and Chris Nguyen, recent graduate from the Ted Rogers School of Information Technology Management.

Both Rahnama and Nguyen are also actively pursuing their own projects in the DMZ. Rahnama's project, the Paris Metro Travel Assistant, is a mobile application designed to help passengers with disabilities navigate their way in the Metro system. Commuters using the application will have a wealth of information at their fingertips as their mobile phones continually adapt to their changing environment and track their progress from station to station. The software will roll out in Paris in late May.

Nguyen, already an entrepreneur (having conceived and realized a successful business, JobLoft.com, while still a student at Ryerson), will launch the first project out of the DMZ this morning. TeamSave.com (Together Everyone Achieves More - TEAM) is an online social buying concept that offers volume sales discounts. Groups large enough to take advantage of these discounts are mobilized through the website using social media 'sharing' applications. Each deal is limited to a 24-hour time frame, creating a sense of urgency which guarantees retailers a high volume of sales and a cost-effective stream of new customers. The service is now up and running, offering new deals every day.

"The Digital Media Zone is about coming up with great ideas, but taking it a step further and executing those ideas to create amazing businesses," said Nguyen. "The projects created within the DMZ will really shape the Canadian technology landscape, but most importantly, the global business landscape."

There are more than 25 active projects in Ryerson's DMZ. Examples of other projects currently under development include:

o Interactive projected ads that respond to the sweep of your shoe or your hand, much like a touch screen but without actual contact (Student leader: Jonathan Ingham, master's student in media production);
o 3-D/Virtual Reality experience, with a special Haptic Feedback Glove that allows you to "feel" the sensation of contact when you reach out and "touch" virtual objects (Student leader: Adrian Bulzacki, PhD student in electrical and computer engineering);
o Burstn, a real-time image sharing platform that uses the context of photos in ways that are the most meaningful to the sender and the receiver (Student leaders: Josh Davey, Ted Rogers School of Information and Technology Management, and Dave Senior, recent Ted Rogers School of Business Management grad in entrepreneurship).

"As an arts-based student, the Digital Media Zone is the only place I know where I can meet and share concepts with students from computer science or computer engineering," said Ingham, president of his own interactive marketing company, Phosphorus Media Inc. "The DMZ is also really convenient since my work requires a considerable amount of equipment. I no longer have to fight for studio time and waste time setting up and tearing down. The convenience factor is good, but the connections the DMZ facilitates are indispensable."

For further information about the DMZ go to www.ryerson.ca/dmz.

To learn more about the DMZ, visit www.ryerson.ca/news/media/spotlight/dmz.