Science and Research Committee on March 9th, 2023

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Corey Tochor]

Thank you so much. We are out of time, Mr. Collins.

[Chad Collins, Liberal, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Corey Tochor]

I appreciate that.

Mr. Blanchette-Joncas, you have two and a half minutes.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I have another question for Mr. Gravelle.

Mr. Gravelle, I'd like to get back to intellectual property.

In research, more and more people are talking about the importance of open data and access to knowledge, of course, with a view to science-based decisions and conclusive data.

Based on your expertise, can you tell us whether this reality can be reconciled with the imperatives of protecting intellectual property on everyone's behalf?

[Louis-Pierre Gravelle]

Some countries are looking into the possible adoption of sui generis protection for the data itself. We're not talking about raw data, but about how data as a whole is compiled, refined and cleaned up to make it more efficient.

The government could perhaps envisage a solution like this to enhance the data we have acquired in Canada. It could be used in artificial intelligence models or enhanced through other mechanisms, as is currently done at the IVADO Institute here in Montreal.

It's not obviously incompatible. On the other hand, the various existing intellectual property laws were not designed to protect the data as such.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Thank you for clarifying that.

Canada is trying to compare itself to other countries and to learn from their achievements. People are talking about the Israeli model as an intellectual property and innovation success story.

Could you tell us more about the features of this model and how it differs from the Canadian model?

[Louis-Pierre Gravelle]

There are major differences between the Israeli and Canadian models. To begin with, the Israelis are not afraid to focus on key technological sectors. Nor are they afraid of putting a great deal of money into one or more companies when they think they can be successful. It's a highly targeted approach, whereas in Canada, when you look at a tax credit for research and development, the approach is much more widespread and highly horizontal. We're trying to give a little bit to everyone so that everyone can do a bit of research and development. That's the biggest difference between the two models.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Thank you very much.

[Louis-Pierre Gravelle]

There's another difference.

I don't know whether you've heard about it on the news, but the government recently announced the creation of the Canada Innovation Corporation. Someone came up with the idea of applying a recovery measure, or a tax, when the intellectual property of a Canadian firm is sold outside the country. For example, when Waze, an Israeli entity, was sold to Google, the Israeli government pocketed approximately US$360 million for the technology transfer.

It could be a way of making sure that intellectual property created here with public funds remains here. Selling it abroad would recover at least part of the money.

[Maxime Blanchette-Joncas, Bloc, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Gravelle.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Corey Tochor]

Moving on to our final member of Parliament, we have MP Cannings for two and a half minutes.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Thank you.

I will stay with Mr. Gravelle for the time being. You mentioned some of the challenges that are facing the IP ecosystem in Canada. One was this time between the idea and the marketplace, and the sustained support that was needed.

Could you perhaps expand on that a bit more? What kind of support would be appropriate?

[Louis-Pierre Gravelle]

There are really a lot of different ways this can be done. One of them, for example, could be a more streamlined procurement process from government.

One stumbling block that companies have is that, in order for them to be able to find investors, they need to prove they've made some sales. When you're a start-up or an SME, it's extremely difficult to sell to government, especially if your technology involves computer-related innovations. No one wants to take the chance of investing in a company or buying a product of a company that may or may not exist two or three years from now.

Having a procurement process where we can encourage the solutions that are made in Canada to be presented and tested within the Canadian government or the provincial governments, would be an extraordinary way to allow these companies to refine their products and services and to bring them to other markets, where they could generate more income.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

On a second piece, you talked about the sale of IP. You just mentioned the idea of this clawback. Could you perhaps expand on anything else around that problem of Canada losing IP when our companies are sold? How can we retain that IP here in Canada, based on what you've heard today? Can you expand on anything else we haven't heard?

[Louis-Pierre Gravelle]

Thank you very much for giving me this opportunity.

Today, I've heard words like “theft” and “losing”. I've heard words like people “taking advantage” of some of the IP that's created in Canada. We need to be very careful when we use words like those.

For the past 30, 40 and 50 years, Canada has generally been a very attractive destination for foreign investment. We've been able to attract foreign companies to open offices here in Canada, some of those offices are commercialization offices but many of them are research and development arms. These companies hire local talent. That's why they're here. They subsidize and pay for research and development. They own the IP that comes from that. There is no theft of IP there. There's no leakage of IP there. They come here, they pay the people to do R and D, and they own the IP. It's as simple as that.

The fundamental problem we have is that Canadian companies that do R and D here are not leveraging the IP tools they have at their disposal properly to build assets upon which they can create value. That is fundamental. Having an IP strategy from the start of a company, from the start of an innovation project and from the start of a pivot of a company to a different market, these are fundamental anchor points to be able to capture the IP that's then going to be created and protected, so that we can build IP assets here that remain here, at least as much as possible.

[Richard Cannings, NDP, South Okanagan—West Kootenay, BC]

Thank you very much.

[The Vice-Chair, Conservative, Corey Tochor]

That concludes our witnesses for today. I'd like to thank them for presenting at our science committee and give a big thank you to our members of Parliament as well.

Also, this is a quick reminder that our next scheduled meeting isn't until Tuesday, March 21.

Is there agreement to adjourn this meeting? Seeing so, we now stand adjourned.