ONB Supports The Companies That Will Build A ‘NEW’ New Brunswick
New Brunswick has faced a year of transition. On top of COVID-19 and its impact, a new strategic plan for economic development reset our course for the future with an eye towards closing the prosperity gap between New Brunswick and the rest of Canada.
Opportunities NB (ONB), New Brunswick’s lead economic development agency, has the unique privilege of working with businesses from every corner of the province.
These are the companies that are building a new New Brunswick and ONB has been witness to their continued passion and commitment.
As we head into 2021, our team is focused on supporting the innovation and creativity of these companies, and what we see as the four key drivers of growth for them and for the province.
Growing our Population
Skilled newcomers enrich every piece of New Brunswick’s economy, from industry to post-secondary institutions to our innovation ecosystem. Since establishing operations in Riverview, India’s Tech Mahindra has grown to over 200 staff, and is planning to continue hiring in the coming months. The company has already brought newcomers to the province from India, the Philippines, and other regions from Canada.
“Our biggest challenge remains population growth. We can address that with an aggressive approach to immigration, and we’re doing just that,” says Mario Caissie, Acting Chair of ONB’s board of directors. “We recognize the value immigrants bring to our businesses and our communities, and companies like Tech Mahindra are bringing great talent here as a result.”
Building a new New Brunswick means doubling down on a commitment to work with companies on navigating our homegrown talent pool while making it easier to bring top talent from abroad to our province. Since 2017, heightened restrictions on the U.S. H-1B visa program have created significant challenges for companies around the world. New Brunswick came to the table early, connecting with impacted businesses to offer them a nearshore solution to servicing the U.S. market.
Investing in Productivity
Improving the competitiveness and resiliency of our businesses has never been more important. Improved productivity at the firm level is critical to New Brunswick’s long-term prosperity and central to our renewed mandate. We continue to work with New Brunswick businesses as they invest in productivity. Manufacturers like Waska Cedar Shingles in Clair, for example, has invested in building the world’s first fully-automated cedar shingle manufacturing facility. The results? Lower production costs, reduced energy usage, enhanced efficiency, and most importantly, a massive increase in employee safety.
St. Stephen’s Ganong Bros. continues to thrive due to its own commitment to productivity and technology improvements.
“We recently completed a significant project that allowed us to change how we produce several of our products, adopting innovative new-to-us technologies into our process,” notes Bryana Ganong, President & CEO. “This greatly enhanced our capabilities and we’ve secured new pieces of business as a result; we’re much more competitive now.”
Innovators Thrive in Our Emerging Sectors
ONB has taken a strategic approach to building capacity and existing strengths in emerging high-growth sectors. By identifying and investing in these key sectors we are preparing New Brunswick for continued growth over the long term.
New Brunswick is home to innovative startups in these sectors like Stash Energy. The Fredericton-based energy company was recently recognized as one of the top five thermal energy storage startups in the world by StartUs Insights.
“It’s great to be recognized, and exciting to see just how many companies are tackling thermal storage,” notes CEO Jordan Kennie. “It’s reinforcement that comes at a great time as we get ready to roll out product. This confirms we’re in an exciting sector and we’re on the right track.
Meanwhile, our province’s world-class cybersecurity ecosystem is another reason that innovative companies from other emerging sectors are looking at New Brunswick. Smart Grid technology, for example, requires substantial security efforts to be safe and effective. Digital health technologies include hardware and software that track and measure heart rate, blood sugar levels, pulse, and more. This is highly personal patient data that needs to be well secured. New Brunswick offers healthcare groups a safe innovation ecosystem thanks to our many cybersecurity assets.
Big Names Continue to Grow in New Brunswick
Cooke Seafood is the largest independent seafood company in the world. In August, Cooke reported that they were looking to grow their footprint by 100 employees across their Atlantic Canadian operations. With 25 processing facilities and over 9,000 employees, Cooke ships a billion pounds of seafood to 67 countries worldwide. They continue to grow, proving that in New Brunswick we know how to couple abundant natural resources with highly productive human resources to create a winning, world-class team.
Large homegrown companies like Cooke are vital in our collective effort to build the new New Brunswick, and they need to be complemented by new investment from outside the province.
“Global success feeds more local success,” notes ONB CEO Sadie Perron. “That is why globalizing the New Brunswick brand is a key piece of our strategy to energize the province’s private sector.”
To that end, ONB continues to leverage the New Brunswick Advantage — the winning combination of our people, infrastructure, innovation, and agility — to attract more world-class global businesses to our province. The new arrivals bring to the province also buy homes, frequent our shops, dine in our restaurants, and support our communities in so many other ways. New investment by large companies like Tech Mahindra, TD, HCL Technologies and others helps our small businesses and our population grow, it’s that simple.
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This story is sponsored by ONB.