Innovation Blast: Thursday, Apr 14, 2022
Here’s the latest on a wide range of innovation in the Edmonton region. Feel free to share it and let us know how we can improve the Blast. Let’s begin!
Hydrogen key to fuelling the future, PM says on Edmonton stop
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is bullish on the role of hydrogen in Canada’s transition from conventional oil and gas. “When I got back from my trip to Europe a few weeks ago, we immediately started digging in even further and even more ambitiously … on hydrogen, because we know how key that is to fuelling the future in zero-emission ways,” he said at a news conference hosted by Innovate Edmonton on April 12. “That’s something that Edmonton, for example, is leading strongly on.”
Innovate Edmonton CEO Catherine Warren was equally enthusiastic about the opportunity. “Edmonton is advancing the renewable energy transition and welcoming billions in hydrogen investment,” she said. “We know that private capital wants green investment. We know that green growth is economic growth, that they’re two sides of the same coin.”
The federal budget that was tabled on April 7 includes $2.6 billion in tax incentives for carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS), over the objections of some who are skeptical about the technology’s potential to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Six projects in the metro Edmonton region have been approved to determine the viability of carbon sequestration, which can be combined with hydrogen production.
Alberta’s Industrial Heartland Association executive director Mark Plamondon said the budget announcement “positions our region very well from a perspective of enabling companies to reach both their economic and environmental objectives.”
Trudeau also used the opportunity to emphasize a new small business tax policy that enables businesses to continue benefitting from the lower rate even as they grow and scale up.
Funding & Support for Entrepreneurship
- The newly unveiled Alberta Technology and Innovation Strategy (ATIS) aims to position the province as an internationally recognized tech and innovation hub through five key goals: building the talent pool, increasing access to capital, improving support for commercialization, optimizing the innovation ecosystem, and enhancing Alberta’s global reputation. The province said the plan seeks to create 20,000 new jobs and add $5 billion in annual revenue for tech companies by 2030. Alberta’s renewed tech focus, spearheaded by Doug Schweitzer, the minister of jobs, economy, and innovation, is a marked difference from the UCP’s 2019 budget cuts to tech and innovation, BetaKit reports.
- Applications are open until April 25 for the Startup Edmonton Student Founders Program, offering support to young entrepreneurs in the early stages of an innovative product or service.
- Destination Canada published a piece in Skift on University of Alberta researcher Alona Fyshe’s thoughts about Edmonton as a hub for artificial intelligence research and the organizations that are contributing to the city’s AI ecosystem, including the Alberta Machine Intelligence Institute (Amii), the Alberta Artificial Intelligence Association, the Kule Institute for Advanced Study (KIAS), and AI4Society.
- Parkland County and the Greater Parkland Regional Chamber are offering a speaker series for small and mid-sized businesses. Their first speaker was Ken Jurina of the digital marketing agency Top Draw.
- The A100 is inviting the tech-curious to attend “behind the scenes” scheduled visits to local tech companies as part of AccelerateAB, an annual event connecting tech ecosystem stakeholders.
Tech
- Bitcoin Well signed an agreement with Beck Antiques & Jewellery, a store with locations in Edmonton and Leduc, allowing the company to make bitcoin accessible to clients. “We are pleased to add Beck to our Partner Program, which efficiently expands our customer and revenue base without having to invest additional capital,” said Bitcoin Well CEO Adam O’Brien in a release.
- Beamdog, an Edmonton-based video game developer created by Bioware Co-Founder Trent Oster, will be acquired by the American game company Aspyr Media, which will gain parts of Beamdog’s catalogue including its first original title, MythForce. Oster said the acquisition will allow the company to focus on “building the great games we want to play while properly looking after established fan-favorite RPGs.”
- SkillsTrader is collaborating with Women Building Futures to boost the number of female tradespeople in traditionally male-dominated jobs as a labour shortage of skilled tradespeople looms across Canada.
- Alberta Machine Intelligence Institute (Amii) advisor Jared Smith wrote a blog post about the impact of artificial intelligence on diversification in Alberta. He also invites businesses to attend and sponsor AI Week, which is happening May 24 to 27. “This annual event will build the AI talent pool, enable global connections, and amplify this vital cornerstone of Alberta’s current and future economy.”
Climate Emergency & CleanTech
- Environmental Material Science, a soil remediation company based in Edmonton and Saskatoon, was announced as the big winner at Startup TNT‘s Cleantech Investment Summit on April 7. The summit finale also saw side deals for Edmonton’s Nanode Battery Technology, Saskatoon’s LightLeaf Solar, and Picketa Systems, a Fredericton company that made the top 20 and caught investors’ eye, even though it wasn’t a finalist.
- NOVA Chemicals and Enerkem are advancing innovative chemical recycling technology to the pilot stage in Edmonton with $4.5 million in funding through Alberta Innovates’ Technology Innovation and Emissions Reduction (TIER) program. The companies will be piloting a reactor system that converts syngas from non-recyclable plastics into feedstocks for virgin-grade plastics, according to a release.
Public Health
- DrugBank has secured $9 million in seed funding, allowing it to expand its AI-powered technologies to tackle the challenges brought on by the exponential growth in the world’s biomedical data. “DrugBank will become a critical infrastructure for health care and change the way medicine is done,” CEO Mike Wilson said in a post published by investor Amplitude Ventures. “Our platform will enable better decision-making by researchers, health-care providers, and regulators than what is possible today.”
- The Biosafety Level 3 Lab at the University of Alberta has helped a Calgary company develop a virus-killing device that will soon be installed at the Edmonton International Airport and government offices to help stop the spread of COVID-19. TESER Advanced Sanitization Technologies developed the TESER ACT unit, which uses ultraviolet-C light to kill all kinds of viruses, including SARS-CoV-2.
- Dr. Lorne Tyrrell of the Li Ka Shing Applied Virology Institute has been recognized for his contributions to the field of medical microbiology with the 2022 John G. Fitzgerald Award from the Canadian Association for Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases.
- The QS World University Rankings by Subject has ranked the University of Alberta as the top institution in Canada for nursing. The faculty has moved from 17th in the world in 2018 to ninth overall in 2022.
Social Impact
- Led by the YEG Seniors Alliance in partnership with the Edmonton Police Service, senior-serving groups have joined forces to create seniorfraudalert.ca, a plain-language site that combats online scammers who target seniors. “We found seniors continue to get defrauded, often because they don’t understand jargon like URL or phishing,” Linda Ensley of the St. Albert Seniors Association told Alberta Prime Times.
- The Edmonton Zone Medical Staff Association‘s opioid poisoning committee has laid out a series of recommendations for the provincial government to reduce drug poisoning deaths, including increasing access to supervised consumption sites, implementing a safer drug supply program, and decriminalizing personal possession. City council’s community and public services committee has voted to develop a drug decriminalization strategy, and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau discussed the opioid crisis with Mayor Amarjeet Sohi in Edmonton this week, criticizing the provincial government’s focus on recovery instead of harm reduction. In 2021, 1,771 Albertans died of drug poisoning, 674 of whom were in Edmonton.
Bits & Pieces
- LinkedIn’s Workforce Report for Canada indicates a faster rate of workforce growth than in the U.S. The University of Alberta ranks sixth on the list of top schools in Canada for tech talent. Edmonton saw a 1.5% increase in tech talent growth over the past 12 months, on par with the San Francisco Bay Area but less than Calgary’s list-topping 2.2%.
- Digital Alberta, which has had a group of volunteers running its programs for over 20 years, put out a call for a full-time Executive Director. “(We) are about to kick these efforts into overdrive!” the non-profit declared on LinkedIn.
- The City of Edmonton has launched a new place brand digital platform why.edmonton.ca, which showcases Edmonton’s businesses, people, innovations and organizations through downloadable videos, photos, stories, and facts.
Other Mentions
- Innovation Growth Council member and Unbelts founder Claire Theaker-Brown was featured by Postmedia after her company’s products were featured on the red carpet at the 2022 Oscars.
- “As North America’s fastest-growing tech sector, Edmonton is ready to leverage these diverse, provincewide supports. Together, we are building a global innovation capital – an inclusive city of innovators tackling urgent global challenges, attracting enlightened investment and commanding international market share,” said Innovate Edmonton CEO Catherine Warren in the provincial news release announcing the Alberta Technology and Innovation Strategy.
- While visiting Innovate Edmonton, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau shook hands and spoke with local entrepreneurs, including SketchDeck.AI Co-Founder & CEO Daniel Kamau and Cash2Crypto‘s Co-Founder Andre Diaz.
The Blast is curated by Taproot Publishing and published by Innovate Edmonton.