CCI’s Manitoba Priorities for Fall 2024

By Jess Sinclair
CCI Director of Prairie Affairs

Manitoba premier Wab Kinew recently reflected on his government’s successes and shortcomings one year into its mandate. Though the Premier and his party both enjoy high approval ratings, Kinew has been up-front about the challenges before the province, namely in the areas of healthcare service provision and chronic deficits.

Collaboration with homegrown innovation leaders will be key to unlocking jobs, prosperity, and better services for Manitobans. CCI has long advocated for thoughtful innovation policy in the areas of government procurement (ie. service provision), intellectual property commercialization, and talent, because this formula has worked for jurisdictions the world over. Solid strategies that drive the intangible economy create a flywheel effect as thriving ecosystems take on a life of their own.

CCI and our Manitoba members have been calling on the province to work toward crafting and developing innovation strategies reflective of the formula above. This vision should include policy direction on intellectual property, digitization of government, and the increased participation of local innovators in the province’s policies when it comes to skills, talent, procurement and economic development program funding.
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Key Recommendations:

1. Improving health service provision and driving better health outcomes and cost-savings through smarter innovative health procurement practices in the province.
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2. Establish a Manitoba Innovation Advisory Committee or similar stand-alone body to liaise directly with local innovators.
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3. Supporting Manitoba’s brightest minds in commercializing their ideas through updated intellectual property commercialization frameworks.
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4. Spearheading flexibility and filling programming gaps within the province’s post-secondary system for the upskilling and retraining essential to the innovation sector.
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Manitoba is facing many of the challenges other Canadian provinces are looking at, but most policymakers and officials I’ve spoken with want to tackle these issues head-on. The province has a clear opportunity to focus on a few areas that will help address the urgent needs of Manitobans in the immediate term and lay the groundwork for reduced spending, labour productivity, and a more prosperous innovation ecosystem down the line.

Government and industry leaders should seize thus considerable opportunity by working hand-in-glove with one another.

Jess Sinclair leads CCI’s advocacy efforts in the prairies, and can be reached at jsinclair@canadianinnovators.org. To learn more about CCI's advocacy priorities in Manitoba, read our 2025 Manitoba Pre-Budget Submission here.
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À propos du Conseil des innovateurs canadiens

Le Conseil des innovateurs canadiens est une organisation nationale basée sur ses membres qui remodèle la façon dont les gouvernements à travers le Canada pensent à la politique d'innovation, et qui soutient les entreprises d'envergure nationale pour stimuler la prospérité. Fondé en 2015, le CCI représente et travaille avec plus de 150 entreprises technologiques canadiennes à la croissance la plus rapide. Nos membres sont les chefs de la direction, les fondateurs et les cadres supérieurs qui sont à l'origine de certaines des entreprises à grande échelle les plus prospères du Canada. Tous nos membres sont des créateurs d'emplois et de richesses, des investisseurs, des philanthropes et des experts dans leurs domaines de la technologie de la santé, des technologies propres, de la fintech, de la cybersécurité, de l'IA et de la transformation numérique. Les entreprises de notre portefeuille sont leaders sur leur marché vertical, commercialisent leurs technologies dans plus de 190 pays et génèrent entre 10 et 750 millions de dollars de revenus annuels récurrents. Nous plaidons en leur nom pour des stratégies gouvernementales qui augmentent leur accès aux talents qualifiés, au capital stratégique et aux nouveaux clients, ainsi qu'à une liberté d'exploitation élargie pour leurs poursuites d'échelle à l'échelle mondiale.