For Gary Stairs, founder CEO, and principal investor of Stellar Futures, these are both the best and the worst of times. He is inspired by rapid advances in AI, robotics, and cybersecurity, but also deeply concerned about the growing threats from climate change and global instability.
At Stellar Futures, Gary aims to establish the global benchmark for life-saving public warning technology. He wants to protect vulnerable communities while building a high-growth, high-impact enterprise. His goal is to create a modern, precise public alerting system accessible to everyone, everywhere: Stellar Alerts.
“We aim to replace outdated Cold War-era systems with smarter predictions, improved forecasting, and innovative funding for new technological solutions. Our purpose is to save lives and property endangered by weather and climate threats, especially oceanic, pluvial, and riverine flooding,” Gary explains.
Stellar’s mission is to deliver precision emergency alerts using AI and geospatial intelligence, reducing harm in critical moments. Through strategic partnerships, they will generate scalable revenue and sustained profit while expanding into high-risk, underserved markets. From AI-powered emergency alerts to digital learning foundations such as Stellar RHL, Stellar Futures stays true to Gary’s values of community resilience, innovation, and service.
Guided by Vision, Driven by Impact
For Gary, giving back to the community and industry remains a guiding principle for Stellar Futures. The company grew from a series of startups he launched after 9/11, starting with Red Hot Learning, with a clear vision rooted in digital learning principles: visualization, interaction, reflection, and authentic, learner-centered design. Their early work with clients, like world-renowned cymbal-maker SABIAN, helped prioritize top-quality e-learning for a global market.
Currently Gary uses a ‘stealth approach’ around business model and market entry strategy, avoiding the crowded ‘red ocean’ by pursuing a niche, ‘blue ocean’ strategy. His maritime perspective – living on Canada’s extensive coastline – shapes his approach. He sees emergency management and climate change adaptation as two sides of the same coin.
Citing the head of the UN, who said we’ve “gone from an era of ocean warming to an era of ocean boiling,” in the past few decades Gary notes that Stellar Futures’ business model is supported by his own regional, national, and cross-border experience in public safety, emergency management, disaster simulations, and large-scale alerting.
In July 2023, personal household evacuations, during record wildfires and flooding in Nova Scotia, drove home the need for better public alerting. After over 21,000 lightning strikes in 24 hours, and 4 fatalities due to nearby flooding coupled with poor public alerting and warning, StellarAlerts.AI was born.
According to a PREDICTif case study, Stellar Futures’ real-time 3D technology and AI integration are transforming emergency preparedness. Partnering with AWS and Houston-based PREDICTif has expanded their capacity to manage environmental emergencies and serve communities while blending education, technology, and civic engagement. For Gary, this technology epitomizes the innovative spirit of Stellar Futures.
Evolving Leadership in a Landscape of Uncertainty
Gary’s leadership journey was not a clear, linear progression up through the ranks. “At times, it felt like we were in a pinball arcade,” he shares. “Our mantra became resilience, spotting imminent opportunities, and quickly mobilizing resources, customers, and teammates to restart the company.”
Gary adapted by accepting chaos, establishing alliances, and exercising resilient leadership when navigating uncertain terrain or scaling with innovation. “Creative collisions are valuable, and you don’t need a massive payroll or to do it all by yourself. Partnerships and joint ventures are key, yet risky; there’s an acquired knack to this. Above all, you must expect chaos and embrace uncertainty on a daily and long-term basis,” he adds.
Gary also learned that staying nimble, frugal, and humble was key to building a company in one of Canada’s more rural regions, where the domestic market was limited. “We’ve bootstrapped throughout. I miss the deep talent pool from my public sector days. Vulnerability can be scary. I’ll never forget an intense cyberattack on our small team, resolved with the help of a self-taught white hat hacker. That was an unforgettable, sleepless night! It taught us a lot,” he recalls.
Stellar Futures’ biggest challenge today is moving from a classic work-for-hire services business to a scalable SaaS-like model with valuable IP and recurring revenue. They are using a scalable, replicable business model, and investing in generative AI, GIS, IoT, predictive weather technology, and eventually drones.
Redefining Success Through Service and Impact
Early in his career Gary’s measure of success was status and wealth, which he attributes to growing up in a clergy’s family with little of either. Mid-career, it was about solving tough problems and expanding his thinking, as well as cultivating an ‘eight-track mind.’ Today, his definition of success has evolved to include service and meaningful work. “A 2007 visit to Nairobi’s enormous Kibera slum forced me to rethink my values and motivations. Now I focus on serving humanity, supporting the next generation of creative thinkers, and helping to curate bright young people’s careers,” he reflects.
Throughout his long career Gary and his company have won several accolades, including the Simon Fraser University President’s Research Award, the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal for contributions to the Canadian advanced technology sector, AWS Canada National Commercial Pitch Winner, NS South Shore Business Awards Innovation Finalist, the Canadian Telecommunications Association Connected to the Community Award, and the NB Premier’s Industry Innovation Challenge (which won the combined team $5 million CAD). He served as an academic senator for the University of New Brunswick and is also Director Emeritus of the renowned Goose Lane Editions, Canada’s oldest independent book publisher.
In addition to being a former director of the Canadian Advanced Technology Alliance and i-Canada, and a long-time member of the National Education Marketing Roundtable of Canada, Gary also founded LearnNB – a chapter of the Canadian Society for Training and Development. In this volunteer capacity, he led market forays into three continents including Canadian ‘chef de mission’ roles at Online Educa Berlin and e-Learning Africa.
Grounded by Ritual, Fueled by Purpose
Gary notes that since COVID, it’s been both easier and harder to stay focused, motivated, and effective as a leader, thanks to shorter commutes and zoom. His figurative kitchen table became their innovation hub, where his wife redesigned the Toronto Star, while he launched Stellar Futures and StellarAlerts.AI. “Our later-in-life marriage means we’re good at balancing and keeping our eyes on our north stars. I truly value that positive dynamic and the talent we bring to our respective professional pursuits,” he adds.
The downside of living in scenic Blue Rocks Nova Scotia means Gary has no desire to access a gym, but he does consider dusting off the bikes and uncovering the sailboat. He also appreciates isolophilia (love of isolation) and the chance to embrace a simpler, quieter life. “I think it’s important to have a singularity of purpose. I’m grateful for my supportive spouse. We start each day with coffee together and, at day’s end, wind down with Netflix. We also restore our heritage homes, which is its own kind of Zen,” he shares.
Building a Converged, Restorative Future
Gary observes that the values and leadership at Stellar Futures are moving towards what John Jantsch calls “the converged business” that leverages and gains advantage through the 4 Cs of content, context, connection, and community. In other words, being ‘Stellar’: have fun, play nicely, think big, make it sustainable, and create more value than we capture.
His goal is to help build a restorative community by fostering possibility and generosity over problem-solving, fear, and retribution. Stellar applies collective expertise to shape a better future – advocating for the 4 Cs as the foundation for creating a compelling future that delivers greater dividends than simply operating from the patterns of the past.
ESG values and placemaking are central to his approach. “The details of that future become our new context, our new ‘story.’ The degree to which we elaborate on that future and apply our capacity, expertise, and resources to that vision expedites the transformation. And isn’t that why we started Stellar in the first place? To enjoy that better future?” he asks.
Using Technology to Empower and Protect
Gary sees his greatest achievement not in accolades, but in being of service – leveraging technology to educate, protect, and uplift communities. He firmly believes in ‘Technology with a Purpose,’ aiding the digital transformation of communities and organizations in Nova Scotia and Atlantic Canada.
Stellar RHL and its brands – Red Hot Learning, Stellar Learning Strategies, Stellar Mobile, and First Mobile Education – have reached more than 600,000 learners in 23 languages. They served a corporate academy in Stuttgart, created the SurgeWorld training game for the Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles and built the New New Deal game for Los Angeles Times readers. An all-time career highlight was creating the technology for the award-winning Congressional Redistricting Game for USC’s Annenberg Center. Here at home in Canada, these small brands have served 4 different national sector councils as well as Ingenium, Canada’s Museums of Science and Technology.
Gary’s path spans nuclear power, public safety, and early e-learning on New Brunswick’s Information Highway. Stellar Futures has always favored grit over glamour, serving everyone from First Nations students to global giants, having built compliance, security training for Daimler AG and Mercedes, capacity-building for the United Nations Refugee Agency and the World Health Organization, and courses for UN Peacekeeping and the UN System Staff College. Every Stellar project reflects its core mission: democratizing access to information and opportunity.
Today, his focus is even sharper: building technology that protects lives. StellarAlerts.AI creates digital twins of vulnerable communities by replicating infrastructure, topography, and even human behavioral responses. This digital environment will allow policymakers, emergency managers, and communities to visualize outcomes, rehearse interventions, and better allocate resources before disaster strikes.
Stellar Futures’ most recent innovations have the encouragement of heavyweight tech business partners and top-drawer influencers such as the Hon. Frank McKenna (ex-NB premier Canada’s former ambassador to the US, and current TD Bank vice chair). Their most recent strategic partners comprise AWS Canada, the Nova Scotia Community College’s Centre of Geographic Sciences, the UNB Applied Computing Innovation Centre and UNB Ocean Mapping Group, the i-Valley Intelligent Community Association and Custom Weather of Mill Valley California.
In 2024 Stellar Futures was also selected for a top Atlantic Canadian accelerator known as Propel ICT and has progressed through Vision and Validation to the current Traction and Growth cohort. This gave them access to world-class coaches and curriculum with guest speakers and experts, such as New York’s Jen van der Meer, who builds winning business models and strategies.
In 2025 Stellar won a national commercial pitch competition sponsored by AWS Canada and PREDICTif, securing a $35,000 USD investment prize and access to world-class AI expertise. Stellar Futures also received an additional $45,000 from the Invest Nova Scotia Accelerator in 2025, as well as access to topnotch, expert guidance on branding (Dashboard Marketing), pricing (Best Kind Consulting), and finance (Invest Nova Scotia internal staff).
Blending Foresight with Fast-Paced Innovation
Gary prepares Stellar Futures for what’s next by combining accelerator-driven momentum with deep foresight experience, ensuring the team not only “sees over the next hill” but arrives ready to lead. This quote by the Duke of Wellington continues to shape Stellar’s vision. Gary also likens his experience in these business accelerators to earning a ‘Coles Notes MBA.’ Similarly, he compares this learning, his diverse feeds, and constant web-surfing to ‘drinking water out of a firehose.’
He credits his training as a Science and Technology Foresight practitioner – thanks to the president’s office of the Canadian National Research Council (NRC) and then delivering a futures simulation for the Canadian National Science Advisor – as having aided Stellar Futures’ capacity for vision and growth. These foresight projects at the Canadian NRC gave him a solid grounding in futures studies as well as the ability to anticipate emerging trends, translate complexity into strategy, and guide Stellar with a future-ready mindset.
Similarly, years ago Gary also worked with the US National Research Council’s Board on Science and Technology for International Development (BOSTID) and UPEI’s Institute of Island Studies to help bring the Knowledge Assessment Methodology (KAM) to the tiny Canadian province of Prince Edward Island.
His instigation of this innovative KAM project was documented by the National Academies Press in a monograph entitled “Lighting the Way: Knowledge Assessment in Prince Edward Island,” which has had an enduring contribution to public policy and how economic development was viewed by the province.
Building a Legacy of Leadership
Gary shares some cornerstones of success for aspiring entrepreneurs or leaders looking to make a mark in the industry: Take the plunge. Surround yourself with great mentors. Persist and reinvent. Find your purpose – something Bigger, Higher, Bolder. Make sure you’ve raised enough capital and sold enough product to buy your startup the longest runway possible.
Currently, Gary notes that Stellar Futures is slowly planning for succession by involving intergenerational consultants and bringing in younger hires. He is also co-founder of a new monthly ‘startup meetup’ on Nova Scotia’s South Shore and cheers on his talented son, who recently secured funding to start his own business. “It’s special seeing the entrepreneurial spirit pass to the next generation,” he says proudly.
Conclusion
Gary Stairs’ work and leadership approach have had a significant impact on the next generation of Atlantic Canadian business leaders. He continues to inspire, educate, and elevate young people by hiring in various companies, growing interns’ careers. He advocates regionally and nationally; public speaking and training internationally, whenever possible, and demonstrating resilience and character.
By using technology for good, from developing emergency alert systems and digital learning tools to mentoring youth and assisting local startups, Gary stands as a clear example that taking chances, learning from others, staying resilient, and finding a meaningful purpose are the keys to lasting success.
