Mr. Chairman, we are working constantly at a regional office level. The 18 regional offices have an important role to play in preparing clients to get into the international arena, working closely with provincial and territorial governments and, in some cases, local industrial cluster organizations such as OCRI here in Ottawa, or Communitech in the Waterloo area, for example.
We also like to mentor them by showing them that other similar-sized companies—who have given us permission to release their names—in similar industries have succeeded in complex markets beyond the United States. That's one of the roles that we play there.
They describe themselves as 5/95 companies--5% of their business is in Canada, and 95% abroad. The example that I would give you in terms of productivity is that of a particular company in the Ottawa area that got involved in Italy. The Italians bought some technology from this ICT company, and vice-versa. Over time, this small company, a niche player, was able to access the European market through the Italian partner. They sold technology to each other and they developed confidence together in the international marketplace.
Also in terms of multinational enterprises, the value chains are increasingly very important. Surprisingly, some of these smaller companies, with our assistance, are being successful with large multinational enterprises. An example of this is a large American defence company, an aerospace company actually. We spent a day with them down in the United States on Canada Day, when some small companies presented in-house within that multinational corporation. Some of those companies have therefore been able to break into that value chain. It makes them more productive.