Of the many useful things I learned growing up in
Saskatchewan, two in particular stand out as relevant to Canada's research and
innovation ecosystem. The first is the importance of cooperation. The second is
the weather.
Cooperation is the cornerstone of community building on the
prairies, as anywhere really. I learned from a young age that when your
neighbour is building a barn, everyone pitches in to help. "Collaborating
to compete together" has real meaning: working together we create vibrant
communities and resilient regional economies that amplify complementary
strengths and common goals.
This form of "coopetition" defines how various
actors in the research and innovation ecosystem work together. Where once we
might have seen these actors try to upstage each other in a scramble for money
and attention, we now see cooperation to achieve increased academic and
industrial innovation and productivity.
There can be little debate about the need to increase
business investment in research and development (R&D). We have too little
firm spending on R&D (and new equipment and training for that matter). This
translates into poor industrial productivity and innovation capacity.
For academic productivity, we are excellent in our ability to
perform basic science. We need to start focusing more on leveraging and
translating our basic research into practical applications for social and
economic good. Successive expert panels have all identified a systematic failure
in this country to capitalize on the basic research capacity of our world
leading research institutions.
Countries like Canada, with economies dependent on resource
extraction industries, need to start adding value to the raw resources we
extract. Basic research with little or no focus on application or
commercialization becomes just one more example of how Canada exports raw
commodities (in this case ideas) without adding value (commercialization of
these ideas).
Polytechnics and Colleges like George Brown work with many
university scientists. We help them produce PhDs, patents, publications and
products, just as easily as we work with industry to get new products and
services to market. Here are some examples.
In 2012, the GBC Food Innovation Research Studio (FIRSt)
collaborated with scientists at Mount Sinai Hospital / University of Toronto
and Ryerson University to help test whether eating cheese fortified with
Vitamin D could affect the levels of the vitamin in the body. Over the course
of the study we recruited 120 students, staff, and faculty who volunteered to
eat pizza—topped with Vitamin D fortified mozzarella—once a week for 8 weeks in
a double-blind randomized trial. Our food scientists and chefs were able to
design an optimal and delicious Italian style pizza and produce over 100 pizzas
every week for 8 weeks. Leaving aside the difficulty we may or may not have had
in recruiting volunteers, we were approached to participate in the study
because we offered these scientists complementary expertise to help them test their
hypothesis.
This project showcases a unique recipe that blended basic
and applied research. The findings provide scientific support for
commercialization of vitamin D fortified cheese, showing that Vitamin D3 is
safe and metabollically available from fortified mozzarella cheese, even after
being cooked.
Applied research at George Brown supports firms in a range
of industries from construction and Building Information Modeling through to
prototyping and food product development. Companies often access more than one
academic partner in their engagement with industry-academic partnerships. One such company is Clear Blue Technologies.
Their "smart off-grid" street light uses solar panels and wind
turbines to power street lights, networked through wireless technologies to
provide cost effective and green power solutions for lights, traffic cameras
and signs. The company received support from MaRS and Centennial College; at George
Brown our Advanced Prototyping Lab helped take the product from prototype to
production manufacturing. A graduate student from Ryerson University was also
employed on the project. By working together and leveraging complementary
strengths we have collectively helped propel the company from idea to invoice.
And so the weather.
Talking about the weather is a national past time, but it
very nearly passes for religion on the prairies. Perhaps this is because so
much of the growing season is determined by the whims of nature. Being able to
talk about the weather is what is most important – predicting it, observing and
commenting on it, lamenting it. The weather is something we all have in common.
In this sense, weather talk is an important social lubricant, an expression of
our commonality and shared experience in place.
And this is the point. Like the weather, innovation is a
social activity. While innovation may involve a technical challenge, it
requires us to recognize common goals and to socialize and realize we are
stronger when we work together.
Place matters when it comes to innovation. By integrating
the harmonizing strength of regional college, polytechnic, and university
capacity, and linking this with industry, we can evolve the Canadian economy.
Together we can ensure graduates from across the credential spectrum understand
innovation, and can work together to stand up the innovation economy.
This article is reprinted with permission from the Research Infosource Canada's Innovation Leaders 2015 / Feature Article and Editorials.
