Federally funded project aims to build collaborative network of SMEs to grow B.C.’s ag-tech sector

An initiative in British Columbia that received $10 million in federal funding aims to establish a collaborative network to grow small and medium-sized agricultural technology companies in the province.

The “AGtech Innovation Sandbox” (AGIS) will use a model that has been successful in supporting B.C. companies to develop and market digital health technologies, says Dr. Sylvain Moreno, PhD, scientific director of AGIS.

“One of the main goals of this innovation model is to break the silos and bring everybody to the table to create projects together,” Moreno, associate professor in the School of Interactive Arts & Technology at Simon Fraser University, told Research Money.

Moreno developed the model, called “circle innovation,” initially for the Digital Health Circle (DHC), a not-for-profit organization based at SFU’s Surrey campus. He is the director of the DHC.

Since its launch in 2017, Moreno said that the Digital Health Circle:

• has built a network of more than 250 companies;
• introduced 19 new health technologies to the market;
• generated more than $52 million in revenues for B.C. firms;
• created more than 200 jobs; and
• trained 800 highly qualified personnel.

The circle innovation model is focused on collaboration where partners co-develop their product with end users, experts and multidisciplinary teams tailored to their needs, Moreno said.

“This model is scalable and translatable to the ag-tech sector,” he said.

Pacific Economic Development Canada (PacifiCan), Ottawa’s regional development agency dedicated to B.C., announced in April that the AGtech Innovation Sandbox will receive $10 million over the next five years.

AGIS is led by SFU in collaboration with its academic partners, including the University of the Fraser Valley and Kwantlen Polytechnic University.

Moreno said AGIS will provide support exclusively to SMEs to help them scale up and market their technologies, rather than supporting start-ups or large corporations.

The envisioned network will include agri-food producers, technology companies, municipalities, Indigenous communities, not-for-profit organizations, post-secondary institutions, and government agencies.

AGIS activities will include project development, skills training

In 2019, B.C.’s ag-tech sector generated more than 4,000 jobs and produced $176 million in exports, according to PacifiCan.

B.C. has the most diverse agriculture sector in Canada, with more than 17,500 farms and 1,500 agribusinesses producing and commercializing a wide range of food and beverages.

“Right now, all of those stakeholders in the field are not working together,” Moreno noted.

Along with building a network, AGIS will focus on project development to help SMEs realize their vision for innovative solutions and ensure they can successfully market their technologies, Moreno said.

Project development will typically include projects with a value ranging from $50,000 to $500,000, he said. AGIS will provide on-demand support including collaborative project design, management and supervision of results in partnership with stakeholders.

Another activity of AGIS will be skills development, which includes post-secondary students but also reskilling and upskilling of adults in the workforce, as well as farming literacy programs.

“Our main goals include the creation of jobs, the growth of revenue for SMEs, and the training of highly qualified personnel,” Moreno said.

The ag-tech industry in B.C. is expected to at least match the federal funding contribution for AGIS, he said.

“The provincial government is very interested in the project and we’re in discussion with them, so we’re hoping they will support it,” he added.

AGIS currently has more than 60 partners, including more than 30 SMEs across the province, as well as other universities that want to participate.

“There’s a lot of untapped potential for ag-tech in B.C.,” Moreno said. “Our role is really to tap into that potential to bring the sector to the national level and the international level in this market.”

AGIS is expected to create more than 300 new jobs, bring at least 20 technologies to market, and generate $13 million in business sales growth by 2026, according to PacifiCan.

Vancouver ranked among world’s top 35 ag-tech ecosystems

Meanwhile, B.C. appears to offer the right ingredients for AGIS to succeed, judging by a new report on the world’s top “ag-tech and new food” ecosystems, the first report of its kind from San Francisco-based Startup Genome, an innovation policy advisory and research firm.

The report, “Agtech & New Food Edition,” ranked ag-tech/new food ecosystems based on several weighted factors, including economic performance, concentration of start-ups, sub-sector strengths, engineering talent, and level and growth of early-stage funding.

Vancouver is the top Canadian ecosystem in the report, ranked No. 9 in a list of the 35 best-performing global ag-tech/new food ecosystems in cities and regions.

Vancouver’s ecosystem includes precision-farming platform company Semios, which raised $100 million last year, and crop data collection and analysis firm Terramera. The city is also home to food-focused start-ups, such as meal kit company Fresh Prep and corporate catering firm Foodee, which was acquired last year by Sodexo.

The only other Canadian ag-tech/food ecosystem in the top 35 is the Toronto-Waterloo Region, ranked No. 11.

The region is bolstered by sub-sector strengths in artificial intelligence, big data and analytics, and life sciences, according to Startup Genome’s report.

Surprisingly, no ag-tech/new food ecosystem on the Canadian Prairies ranked in the top 35 global ecosystems in Startup Genome’s report.

That is despite the Regina-based Protein Industries Canada innovation supercluster and its industry partners investing more than $485 million over the past three years into growing Canada’s plant-based food, feed and ingredient sector.

There could be many reasons why certain ecosystems do not appear in the report, said Dr. Farshad Fahimi, PhD, director of data strategy at Startup Genome.

The methodology of how Startup Genome ranks ecosystems is built to highlight ecosystems in early-stage innovation and scaling up, as well as activity in their research and patent publications, he said in an email.

Also, only venture capital deals by start-ups are considered in the assessment category of early-stage funding, not government funding for or industry investment in established firms.

R$