T.rex AI wins Startup TNT investment summit

T.rex AI, a company that seeks to make electrical grids more efficient and reliable, won the finale of Startup TNT's Edmonton investment summit on May 28. "So this is what this feels like," CEO Daniel May said at the event held at Edmonton Unlimited, before passing the mic to co-founder Peter Atrazhev. "This is pretty awesome; we can't do it without you, all of the sponsors, all of the investors who have grilled us for many hours, who (made us answer) the same questions from different angles, which can be troublesome, but we navigate it," Atrazhev said. "I look forward to using this and doing the thing." The amount invested was not disclosed, but winners typically come away with at least $150,000.

T.rex AI empowers users to capitalize on the electrical grid using its ALEX AI agent, which can forecast the edge of the grid using data from smart meters in partnership with companies like EPCOR. The multinational smart-meter company EDMI has provided T.rex with US$500,000 in funding and US$150,000 in compute value to undertake its work, May said. "We didn't give up any IP," he said. "We basically bullied a large incumbent into just accepting our terms." The company, which started at the University of Alberta, received an Innovation Catalyst Grant in 2024, was part of a Creative Destruction Lab cohort in 2025, and joined the Level Up program from the Alberta Machine Intelligence Institute in January of this year.

At least one side deal came out of the summit for hi finance, which helps students find grants, scholarships, and bursaries, taking a 15% cut of the money it finds. The other companies that pitched were Fairly Staffing, which is changing how dental clinics hire and pay professionals for temporary work; Innovative Coating Technology Systems, which focuses on high-density diamond coatings for advanced industrial surface protection; and RNARevive, which develops self-amplifying RNA therapies for age-related diseases, with an emphasis on bone health.