Supporting innovative solutions to address labour challenges

Backgrounder

Innovative Solutions Canada (ISC) helps Canadian innovators who want to start, grow, and get to market by funding research and development, and testing prototypes in real-life settings.

Today, Élisabeth Brière, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Families, Children and Social Development and to the Minister of Mental Health and Addictions and Associate Minister of Health, on behalf of the Honourable Lawrence MacAulay, the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food, announced up to $5 million for 5 projects under the ISC program. Each of the selected small to medium sized businesses is receiving up to $1 million to build a prototype of their new innovation.

ISC is an initiative designed to stimulate technology research, development, and commercialization of Canadian innovations. The program's Challenge Stream and Testing Stream help startups and small/medium-sized businesses (SMEs) overcome technology testing and development hurdles so that they can produce globally-demanded products and services, while also improving government operations.

Since its launch in 2017, ISC has supported hundreds of SMEs to get their innovations to market, while helping Canadian businesses grow and creating high-value jobs. 

Under the Canadian Meat Processing Technology Development Challenge, projects include:

  • Exonetik Inc. - Developing a robotic arm system that utilizes artificial intelligence learning to automate challenging tasks.
  • E.O.I Technologies Inc. - Developing sensors to collect data on fast moving conveyor systems.

Under the Enhancing Automation in Controlled Environment Agriculture (CEA) Farming Challenge, projects include:

  • Exonetik Inc. - Developing a robotic arm to work alongside humans to harvest fruits and vegetables.
  • Kinova Inc. - Develop a low-cost and accessible multi-produce picking solution using Kinova’s existing lightweight robotic manipulator technology.
  • Mycionics Inc. - Developing and creating a robotic mushroom harvesting system to address on farm labour scarcity, reduce costs, streamline operational logistics and maximize yield through crop digitization.

Contacts

For media:

Francis Chechile
Press Secretary
Office of the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food
francis.chechile@agr.gc.ca

Media Relations
Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada
Ottawa, Ontario
613-773-7972
1-866-345-7972
aafc.mediarelations-relationsmedias.aac@agr.gc.ca
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