International Trade Committee on Sept. 28th, 2016

[Tracey Ramsey, NDP, Essex, ON]

—whether we should look at having that information held out of Canada, and whether it's a concern for Canadians.

[Ron Taylor]

Yes, there are different viewpoints.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

We're well over time. We're going to move on Mr. Dhaliwal.

Go ahead, sir. You have the floor.

[Sukh Dhaliwal, Liberal, Surrey—Newton, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Welcome, Mr. Taylor. On the 165 small and micro-sized companies, $1.6 billion in sales, and your vision to double it in the next 10 years, congratulations.

[Ron Taylor]

Thank you.

[Sukh Dhaliwal, Liberal, Surrey—Newton, BC]

I'm going to carry on with what Ms. Ramsey was talking about. Jim Balsillie also commented that innovation needs to be the primary consideration prior to undertaking any trade agreements. What are your thoughts on that?

[Ron Taylor]

Innovation is huge. It plays a big part in what we're doing here in innovating and improving and creating new opportunities. We've been fortunate to have Minister Bains down here on a couple of occasions. I'm working with the province right now on a provincial innovation strategy.

So yes, it's very important to have a good innovation strategy and a good innovation blueprint, not only as a province but as a country.

[Sukh Dhaliwal, Liberal, Surrey—Newton, BC]

Okay.

On the other hand, you also said that protection is very important. Michael Geist commented that extended copyright periods prove more costly for consumers and do not encourage creativity. What are your thoughts on that?

[Ron Taylor]

When you look at copyrights in terms of technology, most of what you're talking about has a very short lifespan. Typically, most of what we're dealing with today is obsolete three to five years from now. For what we deal with, most of the copyright protection that we have, we're not selling ourselves directly here in Newfoundland and Labrador in a lot of cases to end users, we're part of a supply chain. If we're selling to Boeing, Boeing is protecting that IP. If we're selling to the banks and financial institutions, they're protecting it.

[Sukh Dhaliwal, Liberal, Surrey—Newton, BC]

Okay.

Is there anything else that you did not mention that you wanted to put in as part of your deliberations? You have two minutes of my time.

[Ron Taylor]

From our standpoint, coming back to some of your earlier questions, most of our companies start out of the gate as global players. A lot of our players are not trying to sell domestically. They're immediately going out into the global marketplace, so access to those markets is huge. Because we come from such a small place, with such a small population, if you're producing a type of software here that can applied in global markets and you're not starting out there from the very beginning....

As a matter of fact, many of our companies were in business for five, six, in some cases eight years before they made their first sale in Canada. They almost immediately out of gate started going to the global marketplace, because that's where the greatest opportunities are for us. Having access, where trade barriers are lowered, just makes that path a lot smoother.

[Sukh Dhaliwal, Liberal, Surrey—Newton, BC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Mark Eyking]

Thank you, Mr. Dhaliwal.

We'll go to Madame Lapointe.

Go ahead.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Good morning and welcome, Mr. Taylor. Thank you for telling us about this little-known aspect of the industry. As Ms. Ramsey said, we have not heard a lot about technology so far.

We are talking about 165 small businesses. That's very interesting. My understanding is that you are mainly working on developing software for aerospace, aviation and banks, as well as anything related to security.

Among the 12 countries of the trans-Pacific partnership, is there one where it's more difficult to open doors to sell your software?

[Ron Taylor]

We sell to most companies through third parties. We are not selling directly. We are selling through a supply chain.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

For instance, Boeing might be present in the other countries.

[Ron Taylor]

Yes, that is correct.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

You seem to be saying that you had a significant spectrum in relation to ocean technology.

Is it easy to sell ocean security systems in Japan?

[Ron Taylor]

Yes. The security systems will deal with ocean observing, deepwater oil and gas applications, maritime security and defence, and high-resolution imaging. If you look at the Franklin ship that was just discovered, you'll see that Newfoundland technology was involved in finding that wreck, with subsea sonar and gliders. There are all kinds of things we do in the ocean.

Interestingly enough, I think people think that, being in Newfoundland, a lot of it falls into shipbuilding and fishing, but that's really a very small part of it. Even when we talk about shipbuilding, most of it is not the metal-bashing. It's not going into the hull. It's going into the technology on the bridge.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

It is a question of public contracts and Canadian components.

In your case, are Canadian technology components on the rise?

[Ron Taylor]

Yes.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Earlier, we were talking about labour mobility between the countries signing the trans-Pacific partnership.

Do you think it would be beneficial to bring workers here to Newfoundland and Labrador?

[Ron Taylor]

Absolutely. Although we have a lot of great talent on the ground here, because a lot of our firms are specialized sometimes they just can't find that person. Right now, although our companies utilize as much local Newfoundlander and Labradorian and Canadian content as they can, there are times when they have go abroad to find those developers and those specialists.

We have been doing that for many years here already, so this is just a continuation of that. I like the idea of the free flow of labour where if we need to bring someone in here, we can, and if we need to go somewhere else to work, we are not going to be impeded by regulations and red tape.

I think we've proven ourselves here in Newfoundland and Labrador. The types of technologies we are offering to the world are world-class. They can compete with anyone. So we don't have that fear of people coming in here. As a matter of fact, we wish more would.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Thank you.

Earlier, we talked a great deal about privacy protection and the physical location where the data are stored. You said that it was a challenge.

In the trans-Pacific partnership, could there be an incentive if some parts were renegotiated? Are there parts that you would like to see improved?

[Ron Taylor]

I think people are always concerned about their personal information: financial, health, legal. They want to know that this information is protected. They know that within Canada we have regulations, firewalls, and ways to protect that information. I think the unknown for people is what happens when it goes outside the borders. What happens when it goes up in the cloud? From my experience, I know how secure that is, but nothing is 100%.

People think, well, what happens? Is my information safe? We deal with that here just on a provincial basis, when we have data breaches and people have access to things they shouldn't, but we have ways of checking that here. We need to understand that as part of the TPP the same type of protection is there. and if it's not, I think people are going to be reluctant. They are going to be concerned. I think that's a normal reaction by people. I want to know that my data is safe. I want to know that my data is secure. I want to know that some third party 10,000 miles away is not accessing things on me it shouldn't.

We are dealing with that regardless of the TPP. We are dealing with that on a global basis with all of the big providers that are out there, and we've seen some of the challenges. Technology is not like a lot of the traditional industries. It moves at the speed of light, and it changes so quickly. There are so many opportunities that are opened up, but whenever you open an opportunity, there can be some portals, things that are created that people can get access to and do some nefarious things with. I understand that.