IP is a critical aspect of the productivity equation as well. It usually comes from the feeling or the fact that IP is commercialized elsewhere. It's discovered in Canada and commercialized elsewhere. Within that is an ecosystem that, at certain points in time, can be quite leaky or can be difficult to operate inside of.
Maybe I'll speak about this from what we believe the advantages of working with polytechnic institutions are in an applied nature.
The first one I spoke about was reducing a barrier. We'll take, for example, lab research. There's a researcher or somebody who's discovered something and wants to look towards the commercialization of it. The first barrier that we think we reduce is.... By removing the sharing of IP by working inside of our institutions, it allows them to step into an environment where that threat isn't there. That's the first part of it.
The second part is the ability for us to connect with industry. We have a wide network of industry partners we work with on a regular basis. That connection allows us to provide that researcher, the person bringing the IP into our institution, to have a better sense of how that's connected.
The other thing is the ability for us to move rapidly and understand the marketplace and what's required on that front for us to put in the necessary advice for and development of a product, and then also provide the skills and talent for the next steps for commercialization. What are the business skills you need to move that forward? I would say that if we had a greater capacity within the polytechnic-college applied area, it would allow for more commercialization of research within facilities that have the researchers and the know-how to do that.
It's exactly what the Labs4 initiative was focused on: the ability to connect with universities and colleges together as part of a network. There's extremely valuable research that's done and discovered. We need to find a way to commercialize that, taking it from the lab to the market and having polytechnics and colleges involved in that process.