Does Canada have an innovation strategy?

#BetaKit #innovation #policy #openbanking #CCI #BenBergen

"I don't necessarily know if the government understands what an innovation strategy is."

Council of Canadian Innovators (CCI) president Ben Bergen joins to answer listener-submitted questions about: the Canada Innovation Corporation, open banking, SR&ED reform, and why the feds are behind on so many innovation files.

Warning: listening to this podcast could be hazardous to your health while playing any "innovation policy" drinking games.

Reference links for topics discussed during AMA:

[ItWasSaucerShaped]

...HM.

I can only speak from my experience as someone involved at a volunteer level interacting with MPs, but:

1) I think a lack of coherency in terms of innovation is exactly what should be expected from a system that is so regionally divided,

and

2) I think when you account for the regional nature of the system, the lack of coherency largely evaporates. It becomes much clearer why a given dollar is going to [X] or [Y] organization, it is not always or even often the case that dollars are simply going to the branch office of an American company and the expertise guiding the placement of that dollar is often quite sharp.

I'll use specific examples from my own MPs, Gord & Sheila out on Vancouver Island:

Our communities in broad strokes really need and want smart ways of dealing with coastal pollution, coastal debris and derelict boats. It doesn't directly interface with tech, but smarter ways of doing clean-up and being prepared for clean-up is exactly the sort of innovation that, acutely, the island could use a lot of.

So if someone from (say) Toronto looking for Canadian investment into cutting edge computer technology were to review Gord or Sheila's work, they might conclude that no innovation happened - but that's only if you conflate innovation with technology, and only if you dismiss the regional nature of the work MPs do.

IMHO we get a picture we can much better appreciate if we examine a given MP's file and then judge that work on the merits of the problems it was aiming to tackle and whether or not the problems were in fact tackled, at what cost, what evidence / expertise was relied on, etc.

[DouglasSoltys]

This episode has a slightly different format with two remote guests. Let us know how you feel about the 'floating head' approach our editor took!

[saattlebrutaz]

Most innovation is not exploiting IP, that's what we have to understand.

[emilyrln]

I mean, _I_ don't know what an innovation strategy is… but I'm not the Canadian government.