Janet Bannister is a venture capitalist at Real Ventures and a board member of 12 different startups.

She is also the founder of Kijiji Canada.

Janet Bannister was a varsity long-distance runner and competed internationally in triathlons.

She twice won the Canadian national triathlon championship.

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Janet has been married to Rob Rutledge, a professional coach, for over 14 years, together they have a 10-year-old son named Andy.

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Janet was born in Brampton, Ontario, a suburb of Toronto, where she now lives with her family.

She has also lived in the San Francisco Bay Area.

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Janet Bannister has been a general partner at Real Ventures, Canada's largest and most active early-stage venture fund, since 2014.

Janet is also currently on the board of 12 startups.

She also served on the board of Postmedia Network and Universe, an event platform which was acquired by Ticketmaster in 2015.

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Prior to becoming a venture capitalist, Janet was the CEO of The Coveteur, an online magazine for luxury content from 2012-2014.

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In 2009 Janet founded a consulting company called JBannister Consulting to help companies grow their online businesses and enter new online markets.

Clients of the firm included Starbucks, Tangerine Bank (ING Direct), and Indigo Books and Music.

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In 2004, Janet found Kijiji Canada, an eBay company, which became the largest classifieds website in all of Canada.

After the success of Kijiji in Canada she was promoted to Worldwide General Manager for Kijiji in 2007.

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Janet started her career in technology as a Director of Category Development at eBay in 2001.

In this role she was responsible for growing eBay from a collectibles marketplace into a mainstream marketplace with multi-million dollar businesses in categories such as Books, Clothing, Home & Garden, Jewelry.

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Prior to working in technology Janet worked as an engagement manager at McKinsey & Company.

At Mckinsey, she lead companies on key issues of strategy, M&A and operations.

She also worked in a wide range of industries (retail, banking, transportation, consumer goods) and countries (US, Canada, Europe).

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Janet also worked as a brand manager at Procter and Gamble.

As a brand manager Janet developed and executed consumer marketing plans and launched brand extensions, consistently exceeding revenue targets.

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Janet graduated from Ivey Business School with a Honors Business Administration degree in 1992.

Janet won the Gold Medal award at Ivey for achieving the highest average grade among the graduating class.

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Janet was a varsity athlete in cross country, track & field, and cross country skiing.

She was also awarded a university Athletic letter.

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