Science and Research Committee on March 21st, 2023

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Do you continue to work with Huawei in any form?

[Dr. Gail Murphy]

Yes, we do.

[Dan Mazier, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Neepawa, MB]

Thank you.

I have no further questions, Chair.

[The Vice-Chair, Bloc, Maxime Blanchette-Joncas]

Thank you, Mr. Mazier.

Mr. Collins, you have the floor for five minutes.

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

Thanks, Mr. Chairman.

Welcome to the witnesses this morning.

I'll start with a question for both witnesses.

A previous 2017 study here in Ottawa focused on IP. It highlighted that private firms do not know what research is being performed at post-secondary institutions, what IP they hold and how to leverage it. One recommendation was to create a mapping program that would enable the private sector to better forge partnerships and links with post-secondary institutions.

I'll start with you, Dr. Ghali. Can I ask for your thoughts on that in terms of ensuring that with local partners, prospective investments could be made by the private sector? How does the university deal with that issue? What are your thoughts in terms of the federal government playing a role in being a sort of matchmaker to ensure that those private investments continue to flow to post-secondary institutions?

[William Ghali]

Thank you very much for that question. I think it's a really pertinent one.

As I said earlier, the partnership programs of the tri-council agencies are a valuable catalyst, because they explicitly connect universities with companies and they incentivize and subsidize those connections by bringing some public sector funding to the table that both the universities and the private sector partner can benefit from.

That said, there needs to be more direct university-private sector engagement. I think some universities are stronger than others. At the University of Calgary, we have ramped up our industry partnerships function. We don't want emails sitting in the inbox of an executive vice-president who's drowning in email. We need to have an office that can answer the same day, do some matchmaking of researchers with companies and have a dialogue of shared interests and shared challenges.

We talk a lot about push-and-pull in science. Actually, paradoxically, often it's the “pull” science, where there's an external partner engaging with universities and asking them if they can help, that can be most impactful, because the “valley of death” is already partially bridged when that's happening. So we are really trying to ramp that up. Can governments—plural—support that kind of industry-university bridging? I think they can, through potential creative programs.

I'll turn it over to Dr. Murphy, if she has anything to add.

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

Thank you.

[Dr. Gail Murphy]

Just building on that, we also have extensive partnership work that goes on. I think there are two opportunities to further this.

There was, in the Liberal platform, a university knowledge mobilization and commercialization fund. I think if we were able to mobilize that, we would be able to have more universities engaging in partnerships.

The second is the new Canada innovation corporation, where there is an intent to help businesses grow. They can grow with the help of the universities. Making sure we're actually able to broker relationships between university researchers and those companies could help us take things out of the lab and increase that pull.

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

Thank you.

By extension, I've had the opportunity to visit the McMaster Innovation Park, where they are leveraging private investment, but they're also leveraging municipal and provincial investments. What role can the federal government play in terms of incentivizing municipalities and/or provinces to make the same kinds of investments we're making here in Ottawa?

I'll start with Professor Murphy, if I can.

[Dr. Gail Murphy]

I think trying to get all levels of government working together is definitely a laudable goal and one we should continue to work towards. I would love to learn more from the McMaster model.

The more we can ensure that companies can grow in terms of planning of space of the municipalities, and then have provincial and federal governments, in particular, help co-fund the early stages of companies, making sure they have a place to start out, the more we will be able to maximize the investment that went into the federal research dollars.

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

Dr. Ghali, I have about 30 seconds left on that issue.

[William Ghali]

Just very quickly, we're a beneficiary at this university of municipal funding through something called the Opportunity Calgary Investment Fund, which is for innovation programs. We have a provincial Alberta Innovates agency and a Ministry of Technology and Innovation that provide us with support in many areas, and of course the substantial federal government programs.

I like leveraging programs. I know that intergovernmental relations are sometimes stressed by those matching programs, but the notion of matching is a good one. We have provincially funded post-secondaries that rely heavily on federal government funding.

[The Vice-Chair, Bloc, Maxime Blanchette-Joncas]

Thank you Mr. Collins. Your time is up.

We will now move to the next round of questions, for which you have two and a half minutes.

Mr. Cannings, you have the floor.

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

Thank you.

Coincidentally, just before this meeting, I met with U15, the organization that supports and promotes research in Canada's largest research universities. It was mentioned that the report of the advisory panel on the federal research support system just came out. Of course, U15 has also been asking for increased support from the government for the whole research ecosystem in Canada. I've been advocating for better scholarship funding for graduate students. This report asks that more money be put into the tri-council to both hire more researchers and give them more funding so they can support grad students as well.

I'm wondering if both Dr. Ghali and Dr. Murphy could comment on that. We'll start with Dr. Ghali so that he can have first dibs this time.

[William Ghali]

It's still easier going after Dr. Murphy.

I'll just say that the report is very interesting. I think it has balanced consideration of funding, as well as of how the governance of the funding agencies is structured. It addresses major science infrastructure, which is an important challenge for all countries, not least for Canada. It also considers the connection between research and innovation, and the pathways to commercialization, which I know is the focus of this committee.

There are many interesting elements here, and I find myself largely endorsing this. I think you want to have a conversation at the U15 table in early April on what each of these elements means, but I think it's a very compelling document.

I'll turn it over to Dr. Murphy.

[Dr. Gail Murphy]

Yes, I agree that it's a very compelling document.

I'll pick up on one piece that you already mentioned, Mr. Cannings, and that is people. Perhaps what we haven't focused on enough in this discussion is that innovation starts with people and it continues with people until it is out there, being used, often by people as well.

It's about funding our graduate students, who are such an incredibly important conduit of the talent that we put out into the world and who are often the genesis of amazing ideas that become companies that help people like Professor Cullis, who developed lipid nanoparticles. We need to invest in people in Canada, and our current investment levels are substandard internationally. We're seeing drop-offs in our application rates. We will start seeing drop-offs in acceptance rates of bringing people into Canada, and in our own Canadians staying here to do graduate studies and then continue on into our economy.

I think it's fundamentally important that we consider the levels and the numbers of people we're supporting through any policies and programs we put into place.

[The Vice-Chair, Bloc, Maxime Blanchette-Joncas]

Thank you, Mr. Cannings. Your time is up.

We now move to the next five-minute round of questions.

Mister Soroka, you have the floor.

[Gerald Soroka, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Welcome to the role.

Welcome, Dr. Murphy and Dr. Ghali. Thank you for coming today.

I'll start off with Dr. Ghali.

Canadian colleges have proven that applied research works in partnering with private business and allowing them to own their IP. Does that ever happen with universities?

[William Ghali]

Yes, absolutely. I think there are all kinds of industry partnerships. There are some in which an industry partner wants very early-stage concept discussion, and there might even be the co-creation of an IP pathway. There are other situations when the partnership is centred around an industry-owned technology and there is a desire to validate, refine and demonstrate impact in an applied sector. Our partnership agreements usually lay out the nature of the agreement. I think that would be true for our whole sector.

We're trying to be sophisticated, fast and customer-friendly as a university when we engage with industry, so that the experience for the industry partner is a positive one. I think we have some work to do in the sector, probably, to be very focused on customer experience, with the customer being industry partners.

[Gerald Soroka, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Okay. Thank you for that.

This is also for Dr. Ghali. Who are the members of AUTM, and how does this help the commercialization of IP in Canada?

[William Ghali]

You've caught me a bit off guard, because I don't want to—

[Gerald Soroka, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

You can supply that information if you'd like.

[William Ghali]

Yes, I will.

[Gerald Soroka, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

I would appreciate that in written form.

Dr. Murphy, you stated in your opening remarks that your company exited to Planview, which is based in Texas. What do you think we need to see in Canada to see more exits to Canadian companies?

[Dr. Gail Murphy]

Thank you for the question.

Yes, that was an exit after 15 years of growing the company in Canada, and it has retained significant offices and development within Canada.

One of the challenges is being in economic sectors that have the growth to be able to continue growing within Canada, and that have the market capital available and the customers available to continue to grow within Canada.

As we grow the sectors and as we grow companies larger and larger, we start creating that ecosystem. Within B.C., I think we're creating that system in biotech. We're seeing that companies are choosing to stay and people are able to move between those companies, providing some cross-fertilization.