Chair and honourable members, thank you for the invitation.
My name is Dr. Ryan Ahmed. I'm an assistant professor of mechanical engineering at McMaster University and the deputy director of the Centre for Mechatronics and Hybrid Technologies. My research focuses on artificial intelligence and electric vehicle batteries. I held engineering roles at General Motors, Samsung and Stellantis, working on electric vehicles and autonomous vehicles in both the U.S. and Canada. I'm a professional engineer in Ontario.
I would like to leave the committee with three observations, followed by three recommendations.
The first observation is that the technology gap is widening. There is a growing gap between Chinese and North American EV manufacturers, driven primarily by vertical integration. Chinese firms, such as BYD, manufacture roughly 75% to 80% of their vehicle content in-house, compared to about 40% for Tesla and 20% to 30% for traditional OEMs, like General Motors and Ford.
Having worked on both sides—at Samsung on the supplier side and at GM on the OEM side—I can tell the committee that the tier-one and tier-two suppliers have a built-in limitation. Each supplier protects its own know-how and optimizes its own subsystem, and there is minimal optimization happening at the vehicle level. Without closing that integration gap, a tariff simply protects a shrinking share of the value chain.
The second observation is that Canada has made a generational bet on a softening market. Canada has committed $32 billion to electric vehicles and battery manufacturing, but the market is softening. With EV sales declining and major automakers scaling back programs, we are commissioning world-scale capacity into a softening market. The 49,000-vehicle arrangement with China must be evaluated in that context.
The third observation is that the Canada-China arrangement can be constructive, but only if it's paired with conditions on science, research and domestic value-added. If pre-built Chinese vehicles are sold directly into Canada, they obviously improve affordability, but they add little Canadian engineering or IP. If the agreement is instead tied to joint research with Canadian universities, local critical minerals sourcing and, of course, enforceable data security requirements, the agreement can accelerate rather than displace Canada's EV sector.
My three recommendations are as follows.
The first is to condition quota allocations on a minimum threshold of Canadian-engineered content and critical minerals inputs, such as lithium, nickel and cobalt.
The second is to require that connected vehicle data from imported EVs on Canadian roads be stored, processed and audited under Canadian jurisdiction.
The third is to direct federal research funding to a national battery and vehicle software program that pairs universities, such as McMaster University, Waterloo and the Polytechnique Montréal, with Canadian automakers and suppliers so that the next generation of EV platforms is co-engineered in Canada, not just simply assembled or sold here.
Canada is not behind on minerals, talent or ambition. It is behind on integrated execution. Handled carefully, this agreement is an opportunity to correct that.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I welcome the committee's questions.