Thank you.
Recently we had job numbers come out--net new jobs--that were kind of surprising. I think there were 36,000 net new jobs, and many of them were self-employment. I found that kind of interesting. I found it interesting that on the political side we took a little bit of heat from the opposition, who were almost making light of the self-employed component of it. But I was kind of struck thinking about what happened there.
I was thinking back to the tech crash and sort of what happened in the circumstances there. It seems to me, based on what I've heard, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, that there was a lot of focus on the crash or the bursting of the bubble, so to speak, at that time. But one of the things there wasn't as much focus on was what happened to a lot of the people who lost their jobs during that time. They went out and started new small, self-employed situations at the beginning, which have now actually turned into pretty strong companies in the IT sector.
I see in those job numbers that were recently announced maybe something similar happening, maybe on a broader level than just IT. But certainly, in both your areas, there might be a kind of component of that. We also see it happen, in a sense, when companies in the biotech field, for example, are sold, and the original founder of the company that was sold goes out and starts a brand new venture that winds up being successful as well. In all the darkness of the global economic crisis, that is to me something to grab on to. There is some opportunity there. Maybe something positive that's coming out of this is that people are taking the initiative to go out and start on their own.
There are obviously some challenges. We talked about venture capital. That's going to be a challenge for some of the folks, but we do have government programs through BDC, and not only on the venture capital side. There are also consultants who will help guide someone through the process, someone who is maybe more IT-related or more science-related but not so business-oriented, to kind of navigate through the other granting councils. We have business incubators and things like that to help people through that process.
Maybe you could speak a little bit to the potential opportunity that arises out of this, and then talk about what you see as the government's role in fostering this in balance with industry's role in fostering this.