Media Contact: May Tin, Marketing Manager
Phone: 250-509-0072
Website: https://www.cocoflo.tech/
Cocoflo, an internationally recognized tech software developer, is expanding its business footprint to Stafford, Virginia as their first US headquarters.
According to Jonathan Levitt, Cocoflo’s Vice President for Growth, said that “Choosing Stafford, Virginia was an easy choice. It’s strategic location, RIoT accelerator program, and the Virginia Smart Community Testbed attracted us to Stafford.”
As a rapidly growing software company based in Canada that provides cloud-based city services to governments across North America, Cocoflo develops customized cutting-edge technology solutions in communities by partnering with local government organizations to digitally transform and refine their community functions.
With mentorship and collaboration from Stafford County, Virginia Innovation Partnership Corporation (VIPC), the Virginia Smart Community Testbed, and RIoT, Cocoflo is strategically positioning their US market expansion in one of North America’s top states to do tech business. According to Virginia Economic Development Partnership, Virginia is the number one cybersecurity leader in the US and also the third top state for business.
Cocoflo is a recent graduate of the first cohort in the Virginia RIoT Accelerator program (Virginia-RAP), funded, in part, by a Go Virginia Region 6 grant to the Stafford EDA. The intensive 12-week Virginia-RAP program provided Cocoflo mentorship and advice to launch in the US and connections to global technology networks and partners across RIoT’s diverse business ecosystem. Virginia-RAP is housed in the Virginia Smart Community Testbed (Testbed), the heart of Stafford’s growing smart community and place for innovation sensor technologies and IoT.
In 2021, Stafford County, the Virginia Innovation Partnership Corporation (VIPC), and OST opened the Commonwealth’s first smart community testbed built on an IoT and tech-focused platform. The vision of the Testbed is to make the Commonwealth of Virginia a leading state in Smart Community implementation, focusing on the economic and social benefits of the digital transformation. With Cocoflo’s cutting-edge technology solutions, the Testbed and Stafford’s Economic Development department recognized an opportunity for Stafford and invited them to test their products in real-time in Stafford.
Over the past six months, Cocoflo has worked exclusively with the Testbed and Stafford to design a local pilot project that, when deployed, will improve Stafford’s critically identified flood zones. With the help of Cocoflo, the pilot project will provide smart community and IoT flood sensor modeling that will be designed to notify area residents to prepare for flooded roads and provide alerts to use for emergency management, when fully developed.
Cocoflo is an example of a success story nurtured by RIoT and the Virginia Smart Community Testbed.
“The unique combination of federal, state, local, and private partners and sponsors in the Testbed provides an asset for the entire Commonwealth to deploy pilot projects in smart technology,” said John Holden, Director of Economic Development and Tourism for Stafford County. “The additional benefit to Stafford is the opportunity for us, with the Testbed and RIoT, to foster new technology companies via entrepreneurship and attract new technology business from outside Stafford and, frankly, across the globe.”
Cocoflo is opening their US headquarters in Stafford by the end of 2022, creating two new jobs with future expansion plans. Stafford is leading the way in smart city solutions and is excited to welcome Cocoflo to one of Northern Virginia’s diverse business communities.
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