Clinics & Labs | Faculty of Law

The Norton Rose Fulbright Entrepreneurship & Innovation Legal Clinic

The Norton Rose Fulbright Entrepreneurship & Innovation Legal Clinic is a national, bilingual clinical program that provides early-stage Canadian entrepreneurs with practical, business-law-oriented pro bono legal services. Named after Norton Rose Fulbright, one of Canada's leading national and international law firms, the Clinic is delivered in strategic partnership with Futurpreneur, Canada's largest organization supporting young entrepreneurs (ages 18–39). Together, the Clinic and Futurpreneur advance access to justice by ensuring that entrepreneurs across Canada have access to high-quality legal advice at the most critical stages of launching and growing their businesses. This partnership enables founders to address complex legal issues that would otherwise be financially out of reach, helping them build stronger, more compliant, investment-ready, and scalable businesses.

Under the leadership of its Founding Director, Professor Garrick Apollon, the Clinic occupies a unique position within Canada's legal education landscape. It is one of the few clinical programs in Canada to provide both bilingual (English and French) and bijural (common law and civil law) legal services, allowing it to support entrepreneurs from every province and territory. This national mandate enables the Clinic to serve entrepreneurs across Canada regardless of their language or legal jurisdiction, while fostering a more inclusive and accessible entrepreneurial ecosystem. The Clinic is committed to advancing access to justice and economic justice by supporting entrepreneurs from equity-deserving communities, including Indigenous, Black, women, newcomer, who often face disproportionate barriers in launching and scaling their businesses.

Entrepreneurs receive legal assistance on a broad range of business law matters, including business formation and structuring, commercial agreements, intellectual property strategy and protection, employment law, regulatory compliance, and legal risk management. All legal services are provided under the direct supervision of Professor Garrick Apollon, the Clinic's supervising lawyer, ensuring that every client receives advice that meets the highest professional standards.

Training the Next Generation of Entrepreneurial Lawyers

The Clinic is more than a provider of legal services—it is a cornerstone of experiential legal education and entrepreneurship at the University of Ottawa. Students are not simply trained to identify legal issues; they are challenged to think like entrepreneurs and trusted strategic advisors who use the law as a tool to create, protect, and maximize business value.

Each year, selected law students are appointed as Legal Caseworkers, working directly with startup founders on real legal matters under Professor Garrick Apollon's close supervision. Through this immersive experience, students develop practical skills in client interviewing, legal research, legal drafting, negotiations, and transactional business law while learning to understand the commercial realities faced by entrepreneurs. They are encouraged to move beyond legal compliance by identifying opportunities to support innovation, commercialization, investment readiness, competitive advantage, and long-term business growth.

This distinctive educational philosophy reflects Professor Apollon's unique professional background as both an experienced business lawyer and entrepreneur. By combining these perspectives, he mentors students to understand that the most effective business lawyers do more than solve legal problems—they understand how businesses are built, how entrepreneurs make decisions, and how legal advice can become a strategic asset that drives innovation and growth.

Since its launch, 24 University of Ottawa law students have served as Legal Caseworkers, receiving intensive, hands-on training while working on real client files under professional supervision. The Clinic equips graduates with not only strong legal knowledge but also the entrepreneurial mindset, commercial awareness, and strategic advisory skills increasingly expected of modern business lawyers.

Futurpreneur video call with entrepreneurs — Clinic

Entrepreneurship & Innovation Legal Clinic

National Leadership

In a remarkably short period of time, in one year, the Clinic has established itself as one of Canada's leading university-based entrepreneurship law clinics. Through its partnership with Futurpreneur and other partners, the Clinic has developed an innovative national model that integrates access to justice, experiential legal education, and entrepreneurship into a single clinical program. During its first academic year alone, the Clinic completed 24 client engagements, delivered 380 hours of pro bono legal services, and generated an estimated $247,000 in pro bono legal value for Canadian entrepreneurs who otherwise would not have been able to afford sophisticated business legal counsel. At the same time, 24 University of Ottawa law students received intensive practical training by representing real startup clients under professional supervision.

See report here for year 1 – fall 2025 and winter 2026

By bringing together the University of Ottawa, Norton Rose Fulbright, Futurpreneur, and Canada's entrepreneurial community, the Clinic demonstrates how universities, the legal profession, and the innovation ecosystem can work together to expand access to justice, accelerate entrepreneurship, and prepare the next generation of entrepreneurial lawyers who create value not only through legal excellence, but also through strategic business thinking.

uOttawa Startup Legal Clinic

The uOttawa Startup Law Clinic, housed within University of Ottawa’s Faculty of Law, is an experiential-learning legal clinic that offers early-stage startups in the Ottawa region access to legal information (not personalized legal advice) on corporate transformation, securities, intellectual property, employment, and technology law.

Key Features

Student-run: Upper-year law students act as “case-workers,” interviewing founders, researching legal issues, drafting memoranda, and giving presentations.
Focus on startups with social impact and innovation-driven models.
Covers core legal domains relevant to startup growth: when and how to incorporate, ownership splits, funding instruments, IP protection, employment/contract issues.

Leadership

The clinic is led by Professor Doug Sarro who serves as its Academic Director.

Garrick_Doug — uOttawa Startup Law Clinic

uOttawa Startup Law Clinic

Uottawa Legal Technology Lab

The LegalTech Entrepreneurship Lab is the Faculty of Law’s gateway into the AI revolution taking place at uOttawa Kanata-North, located heart of Canada’s largest technology park. The Lab introduces students to legal technology and artificial intelligence—systems that use automation, data, and machine learning to transform legal work and expand access to justice.

This focus area supports law students and faculty who want to:

design or collaborate on AI-enabled legaltech ventures,
explore how technology can reduce barriers to legal services,
study the legal, ethical, and policy challenges of emerging AI tools, and
develop leadership skills at the intersection of law, entrepreneurship and public impact.

What participants gain:

Practical experience building or advising AI-driven solutions that simplify legal processes and improve access to justice.
Exposure to the ethical governance of AI, including strategies to prevent algorithmic bias, strengthen transparency, and manage risk.
Hands-on collaboration with engineers, computer scientists, and industry partners in the Kanata-North ecosystem.
Skills that prepare them to become lawyer-innovators, founders, policymakers, or advisors on responsible AI adoption.

The Lab empowers students to help shape the future of law in an AI-driven world—where technology can enhance fairness, improve public access, and enable more inclusive justice systems.