At Blue Ocean CMC we have assisted several small businesses advance their business plans towards their respective objectives. All our clients brought forward innovative technologies. Some in electronics, telecoms, biotech and industrials. All of the solutions brought forward were bringing or would have brought higher quality alternatives to the market, at a lower or similar cost than the current propositions.
We have also witnessed first-hand some great market opportunities that could have advanced businesses but were turned down due to a lack of bridging expertise to manage the technology transfer. Implementing technological innovations requires expertise. Advancing new technologies requires service support. This process in Canada needs to be replicated at a much greater and more frequent scale. In 2024, and the past few years, this process has even been in decline.
At a Toronto conference this month, in an interview, the CEO of Wealthsimple, an online investment management owned by Power Corp and Power Financial with over $ 20 B AUM, called the Canadian situation an “absolute crisis”. He also echoed what many industry leaders have been saying for years, that: "turning the issue around will take a “cultural change” and require policymakers and the business community to get on board".
At the same conference, the governor of the Bank of Canada added: “It’s a multifaceted problem and it’s going to take a concerted effort by businesses, by governments, by the academic community, to put their heads together, set some priorities and work their way through it.”
So let's recap. The productivity issue in Canada is a real crisis that needs to be addressed by all communities: governments, academics and businesses and we would add think thanks and investor, labour groups. It has been ongoing for decades but has worsened over the past few years. We are discussing it, more and more, yet gets worse and worse.
Why?
We would argue that the answer is from an apparent lack of action that stems from proper leadership from all the communities that should be active.
The full article can be found on the Financial Post's article: https://financialpost.com/news/economy/wealthsimple-ceo-calls-canadas-productivity-lag-a-crisis
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