Thank you.
The ITB policy is very important for Quebec. There are of course many industry players in this segment, and several sub-segments of defence and security in Canada and around the world.
Yet the vast majority of manufacturers and universities in our sector in Quebec are focused on civil aviation. As I said, the products of research and development are also focused on the defence and security sector.
The ITB policy therefore has a strong structuring effect. It has the potential to enable universities to secure long-term faculty commitments and to lead them to invest in the development of labs. This in turn provides for concentration of activities in niche areas, such as quantum technology, materials, advanced bionics, cybersecurity or the shift to future air mobility, with drones and air taxis. A university that has a structuring contract with a company is afforded a long-term vision, over five or 10 years, which really changes everything.
There are also established research centres, small centres affiliated with technical colleges. These centres benefit as well, because they can quickly acquire the infrastructure for robots or automation systems, for instance, and master those competencies, and their clients are primarily SMEs. This has a strong structuring effect, both for the centres and for future clients.
These kinds of transactions are carried out by certain partners in our ecosystem, but it is on a case-by-case basis. So we need to find ways to ensure that, in the future, contracts under this policy that have structuring effects are not done on a case-by-case basis. That would mean that each of us in our ecosystem would not have to spend so much money and do so much work to meet representatives of this company or that company, travel abroad, come back, meet with people, and so forth. There are a lot of transaction costs for the funded party to be considered by someone who would be agreeable to this investment. That is why I think established structures are important, and I am pleased that the ITB was also raised by my colleague Ms. Cianfarani from the Canadian Association of Defence and Security Industries, because they have very strong direct and indirect structuring effects, and we need more of them.