Bridging the Gap: Canadian Defence Accelerator Unites Industry and Military
Gathered near the gates of Canadian Forces Base Halifax on a blustery blue-sky day in early October, the huddle of entrepreneurs that make up the Canadian defence accelerator Vimy Forge looks like a group of schoolkids fresh off a big yellow bus and ready for adventure.
Together, they comprise Vimy Forge’s inaugural cohort, launched last March. Eight months in, they’ve attended classes, sat through lectures, embarked upon field trips and bonded as new friends whose days are filled with many of the same challenges. These include complex procurement pathways and a lack of local testing opportunities.
Left unresolved, those challenges can be consequential not only for the entrepreneurs and companies themselves but also for the customers they serve.
Duncan McSporran, managing director at Vimy Forge, knows this well from his time as an infantry soldier in the British Army for 24 years.
“I’ve been on the other end of this during my period in uniform, where you’ve ended up with high-tech capability that a company has sold to defence because it can fit,” he said. But, he added, “It hasn’t met the end-user needs and requirements.”
This is the issue Vimy Forge is attempting to solve by putting industry and the Canadian Armed Forces in the same room to speak candidly about the challenges they face.
Traditionally, industry and military have operated in distinct silos, trusting the Canadian defence procurement system to fulfill the military’s needs through its bureaucratic process.
But this presents a problem in that the Forces will not ask for a technology they do not know exists, and industry can’t sell its technology unless it fits the criteria for a specific procurement.
These silos are slowly breaking down, thanks to a concerted effort by industry, government and the Armed Forces to create a system that’s more amenable to defence innovation.
Vimy Forge is part of that transformation.
All of this is occurring as Canada embarks on a spending spree for defence not seen in decades, aiming to spend 5 per cent of GDP on defence by 2035 to meet North Atlantic Treaty Organization obligations, rearm its military and spur the country’s economy.
In January, the accelerator, based in Fredericton, officially launched with almost $1-million from the federal government. The investment came out of a larger $357.7-million initiative delivered through the country’s Regional Development Agencies to help smaller companies enter domestic and international supply chains as part of Ottawa’s Defence Industrial Strategy.
Vimy Forge has also received funding from the government of New Brunswick and through the New Brunswick Innovation Foundation.
The non-profit’s work feeds into Ottawa’s larger goal of boosting the number of defence contracts awarded to Canadian companies and growing revenues for small-to-medium-sized businesses in the sector.
Each of Vimy’s nine inaugural cohort companies is developing technologies applicable to the industrial strategy, from uncrewed ground vehicles to textiles to drone-detection software.
Official programming runs for 12 months, with four in-person week-long intensive sessions spread throughout, during which the companies often go on field trips to military bases and meet with key stakeholders such as government and members of the investment community.
The goal is to create pathways and connections that these companies can use to grow, attract investment and, ultimately, sign on the dotted line of a contract. Then, Mr. McSporran said, “We as a nation end up with the right capabilities in the right hands at the right time.”
Back at CFB Halifax, it’s 7:35 on a Tuesday morning, and school is in session.
On Monday, the cohort toured 12 Wing Shearwater, a nearby Royal Canadian Air Force base, where they learned about the needs and challenges of Canadian aviators. Today, they’re eager to hear the same perspective but this time from a different branch of the Forces: the crews of HMCS Charlottetown and HMCS Harry DeWolf, a frigate and an Arctic and Offshore Patrol Ship, respectively.
Over the span of the next few hours, the entrepreneurs witness firsthand how the navy maintains, repairs and operates its fleet, and where their developing technologies could stand to improve the processes.
But first, standing outside the gates to the dockyard, Mr. McSporran imparts his golden rule: Absolutely no selling.
They’re there to observe, ask questions and receive feedback about how their solution may or may not work for the Armed Forces. The visit is not a pitching exercise.
As morning progresses, this stipulation seems to invite a certain degree of candour into the conversation. The crew is frank about their challenges, from ice navigation at night to connectivity in remote areas to the cooling of computational devices on board.
And the companies are direct with their questions. For example, according to new research published in the journal Nature, only 20 per cent of the Arctic Ocean floor is mapped, one of the entrepreneurs points out.
He asks the crew of HMCS Harry DeWolf if they are actively monitoring and mapping and if they have that capability.
No, a crew member responds, adding that there is no survey data being collected or stored by the Armed Forces ship operating in the Arctic.
This ends up being one of several valuable pieces of information that the entrepreneurs pick up throughout the day. These useful morsels include a slide in a PowerPoint presentation explaining who’s in charge of naval procurement in Ottawa and a word of advice to consider screen brightness when designing technologies that might sit on the exterior or bridge of a ship, to avoid detection.
These are the lessons that make the time away from his office in Toronto worth it for Tomek Bartczak, founder and chief executive of Engineering Design Lab.
But even more than his enhanced understanding of the end user, Mr. Bartczak highlights the camaraderie between fellow cohort members as a massive boost to his understanding of how to navigate the Canadian defence ecosystem.
“Seeing people struggling with the same problems, it’s really useful,” he said.
Adrian Bulzacki with cohort company Prodigy Intelligence has been a part of several accelerators, including the Digital Media Zone in Toronto, which he helped found.
Vimy Forge is different, he said, because the companies have a shared purpose to serve national defence.
“It’s really intense in terms of how many things we have to learn about and the resources they provide to us,” he said. “Vimy Forge is the first one to do it right, as more people are trying to get into the accelerator space.”
On Oct. 7, the Business Development Bank of Canada announced it would join the federal government in supporting the non-profit’s second cohort, which will launch in winter 2027.
Mr. Bulzacki said he’s excited to see Vimy Forge continue to grow.
“There’s this expression in business that time kills all opportunities and you get a sense that now is the perfect time to get these initiatives off the ground.
“You can see that in how much support we’re getting to do it.”
This article was first reported by The Globe and Mail
