Driving Innovation Through Intrapreneurship

‍Strengthening the Canadian SME Profile

‍

Small and medium-sized enterprises make up 99% of Canadian companies, 90%of all jobs in Canada and 85% of new jobs, but there is an intrapreneurship gap for SMEs. Canada has a strong academic, startup and entrepreneur ecosystem and great research ideas, but we need to translate them into economic benefit.

‍

SMEs are the engine of that transformation. We need to support SMEs through education, funding, and talent so that they can compete on an equal footing to their multinational counter parts. These resources will enable SMEs to mitigate risk, leverage new technology and business opportunities to help them pivot into new sectors, export to new markets, create local resilient supply chains and innovate without fear of failure.

‍

‍

‍

‍Partnering with Canada to Drive Innovation

‍

‍

Canada’s government leadership can help us get there. The Honourable Mary Ng, Canada’s Minister of Small Business, Export Promotion and International Trade released the 2020 Canada’s  State of  Trade Report. It states that no sector of the Canadian economy has been immune to the global supply chain disruption. The fallout of COVID-19 has been a major influence in terms of how we will make, design and build products in the future.

‍

‍

‍

Newly appointed Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development, the Honourable François-Philippe Champagne, released the Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry Supplementary Mandate Letter (Jan 2021) where in it states, “We need to work together to protect and create jobs, and to rebuild our country in a way that will create long-term competitiveness through clean growth".

‍

‍

‍

‍

‍

‍