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Analysis

Nortel Networks Corp’s decision to seek creditor protection last week has sent shockwaves through the high-tech community, especially in Ottawa where the company has served as a potent anchor to a telecom cluster whose decline will almost certainly accelerate.

March 12 in OttawaRE$EARCH MONEY Conference

“Challenges of Canadian Firms Going Global”

Canada’s domestic market is too small to support the significant growth of more than a few companies in any given sector.

The appointment of Dr Henri Rothschild as president and CEO of Precarn Inc sets in motion a strategic review that will determine the fate of one of Canada’s most enduring commercialization programs. Currently focused on robotics and intelligent systems, its future direction and potential source of financial support will be determined over the coming weeks with greater clarity once the federal Budget is delivered on January 27.

The US appears set to elevate the status of S&T within government and the nation as a whole with the announcement of the team that will advise president-elect Barak Obama. Citing the need for leadership and emphasizing respect for “the integrity of the scientific process”, Obama is making clear that he intends to break with the current administration’s inherent distrust of science and failure to heed the advice of the nation’s top scientists and business leaders.

Forestry and high-tech sectors take the lead

The Canadian Advanced Technology Alliance (CATA) has followed up its call for a tech-heavy $60-billion stimulus package with a specific set of actions developed by serial high tech entrepreneur Terence Matthews.

Ontario’s growing concentration of workers that comprise the so-called creative class may help the province weather the recession better than the previous economic downturn of 1991. Yet members of the creative class in Ontario are paid significantly less than their counterparts in US peer states and are used less intensively by their employers, casting doubt on the ability of Ontario cities to retain them.

Sherbrooke ranks #1

Canadian universities have done a poor job of obtaining adequate financial benefit from discoveries made within their jurisdictions, suggests a new study by PARTEQ Innovations to identify the Top 10 technologies generated by Canadian universities.

First of five regional offices open

The Royal Society of Canada (RSC) is executing an ambitious new strategic plan to expand its range of influence and revive operations that were in danger of becoming detached from the innovation mainstream.

Sweeping changes made unilaterally to the biggest federal R&D incentive program by the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) are being viewed by tax analysts as a significant shift away from an incentive for innovation towards a mechanism for compliance.

Economic crisis still to register

Statistics Canada has released its final and most substantial collection of R&D data of the year and it doesn’t paint a pretty picture. It shows that Canada’s gross domestic expenditures on R&D (GERD) are projected to be virtually stagnant for the third year in a row and are actually in decline when measured in 2002 constant dollars.