I’m a research professor at Ontario Tech University in Oshawa, Ontario.

I teach business law courses with a strong IT component at the Faculty of Business and IT and my academic research currently focuses on information privacy law as it relates to connected and automated vehicles.

I started Akalu Law in part because I think there is a real need for professors, especially business professors to bridge the gap between theory and practice. There is a world of difference between reading about starting a business and actually incorporating one. You can spend a lot of time analyzing a business, but running a business requires action.

You wouldn’t say that you know how to drive after completing your 365! Driving, like business requires practice and practice necessarily involves making mistakes.

There’s a perception among some business people that academics are privileged elites that live in Ivory Towers that are detached from the ‘real world’. Similarly, there’s a reluctance among some academics to engage with the business community because it’s difficult to translate that type of work into publications for scholarly journals.

I’d like to change that, for myself, for my students, other academics, my local community as well as the professional and academic communities to which I belong.

I have a deep respect for business people after starting my own business. You see things differently when you are a business owner; you’re responsible for what you produce, whether that is a service or a product.

The experience of starting up allows me to offer greater insight to students that are planning to start a business. So far I’ve learned that starting a business is really hard! It’s not for everyone and it’s better that you’re honest with yourself if it’s not for you. Having said that you will never know unless you try. But even if it doesn’t work out, you will learn a lot about yourself in the process. You can apply that insight into your career and personal life.