Mr. Christian Lassonde

Doctor of Laws, honoris causa

For his outstanding work as a business leader and entrepreneur, his dedication as a mentor for the next generation of professionals, and his commitment and support to education and health care through philanthropy and volunteer activities, the university proudly confers upon Mr. Christian Lassonde the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws, honoris causa.

Mr. Lassonde is the Founder and Managing Partner of Impression Ventures, a venture capital firm focused on investing in companies that either improve current financial products or develop new products that ultimately provide lower costs or better access for consumers. Impression Ventures has invested in over 20 businesses in Canada and the US. Investments include Wealthsimple, Symend, Brim Financial, Fraction, Safekeep, Goose and many others. Mr. Lassonde sits on numerous corporate boards including Brim, Sensibill, Finaeo, Fraction, and 401Go. 

Mr. Lassonde is a serial entrepreneur, having started four technology companies prior to Impression Ventures. He spent a decade in San Francisco, California building Virtual Greats, a luxury online property rights broker, and Millions of Us, a leading social media digital agency. Prior to that he built software for Second Life, LucasArts and Electronic Arts and sold solutions to Sony, Nike, Warner Brothers, General Motors, Coca-Cola, Intel and many other Fortune 500 companies.

He holds a Master of Business Administration degree from the University of San Francisco, a Bachelor of Engineering Science in Computer Engineering and a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science from Western University.

Mr. Lassonde is currently Vice-Chair of SickKids Foundation and is a Board Director of the Toronto French School. He is also Board Director of the Pierre Lassonde Family Foundation where he has supported a number of initiatives in education including the Claudette MacKay-Lassonde Pavilion at the Faculty of Engineering at Western University. His late mother Claudette MacKay-Lassonde was the first female President of the Association of Professional Engineers of Ontario in the 1980s and a longtime advocate for promoting engineering as an attractive career for women.

Mr. Lassonde has served on the Fintech Advisory Council for the Ontario Securities Commission, and is a former member of the Board of Governors at Western University and former Chair of the Toronto French School Foundation. Mr. Lassonde lives in Toronto with his wife, Jennifer, and their four children.