I think the description that you were given is a great one. I think that system works well.
Essentially what I'd like to bring to it are two core concepts. One of them is that, as Graham was saying before, some of us are in generations and there are things that we have no clue can happen. As CEO of my company until two years ago, when I saw what these young people could do and at the speed at which they could do it, it was unbelievable for me. There were things that I would call complex weapon systems that were literally being developed in kitchens. That's something that most people can't grasp, and trying to pretend that doesn't exist is both a loss of wealth and loss of an opportunity to manage it as a society.
I would bring a second level to what was just explained. Think of the economic world as a pyramid—I think of it that way—and at the top there's Bill Gates, CGI, Bombardier, and all of these people and then you get all these SMEs. The people who innovate are the people who think of a different way and then they enter the system.
It's like you have to create these sphere environments, little planets that you create where you allow them the freedom to do what they need to do. That gives you both a controlled test environment, if you want to think of A/B-testing, and an environment where they're allowed to transform it into economic value.
The other thing that I think DMZ is working really hard at, and Concordia has the same challenge, is our researchers are not inherently imprinted to turn their research into economic value, and the numbers show it. I read a recent article that showed technology transfer offices across Canada have a net gain of $10 million per year in different licensing fees and stuff like that. You have to think of the numbers. We have a huge challenge. We're one of the biggest investors on the planet in research per capita and we have one of the lowest returns when it comes to money from that research.
Creating these spheres allows our people, our population, to develop that wealth. I completely agree with what was just explained. There is tons of risk, tons of things to manage, but if we don't create those spheres to learn how to manage them and experiment with them, which I have had the fortune to do in the last year and a half.... That really was a discovery for me. At my age, I couldn't have known this. Without sticking my hands in it, I wouldn't have known it.
I hope that answers your question