Goodbye Startup Montreal, hello Quebec Tech. A chapter closes and another form of anglicism is born in the small Montreal and Quebec world of start-up and technological innovation, while the organization dedicated to promoting young shoots in the metropolis changes its name and expands its reach to the entire province.
This transformation comes on the heels of $7 million in financial assistance granted to Startup Montréal last May by the provincial government as part of a review of its Innovation Research and Investment Strategy. The renamed entity will be tasked with making Quebec an international reference in creating and supporting the growth of new technology companies.
Maintaining its economic weight
In the industry, we call start-up newly created companies. When these see their activities or their value reach a more respectable threshold, then move on to an accelerated stage of the growth of their business, they become what are called scale-upyoung, high-growth companies. Historically, Montreal has always been the provincial epicenter of the creation of start-upThe metropolis and Quebec are struggling much more to ensure the survival of their scale-up.
Québec Tech will therefore have to pay more attention to ensuring that the latter can improve their chances of success. In particular, it will help them to expand on the international scene, for which they will also receive assistance from other provincial organizations and institutions, such as Investissement Québec International, in particular.
“We have great young companies in Quebec, but we have fewer than our demographic weight within Canada. We have to work on this if we want to maintain our economic level,” explains in an interview with Duty Richard Chénier, CEO of what is becoming Québec Tech. The Montreal businessman hopes to mobilize existing organizations, such as Investissement Québec International, Montréal International, or even Québec Enterprises Inc., to facilitate the emergence of new Quebec technologies.
Mr. Chénier adds that Québec Tech is inspired somewhat by Alberta Innovate, an organization recently created by the Alberta government that quickly allowed the city of Calgary to establish itself on the North American technology scene. Calgary is now a technology hub that surpasses Montreal in several respects.
“The new mandate of Startup Montréal, which is becoming Québec Tech, is to offer a springboard to these Quebec leaders of tomorrow so that their know-how can shine internationally,” declared Pierre Fitzgibbon, Minister of Economy, Innovation and Energy, and also Minister responsible for the Metropolis and the Montreal region as well as Regional Economic Development, for the occasion.
The end of an era
Startup Montréal is an organization that itself was created in the winter of 2022 when Bonjour Startup Montréal and Montréal inc. decided to merge to combine their activities promoting Montreal entrepreneurship.
At that time, the organization had also relocated its headquarters to Metcalfe Street in downtown Montreal, abandoning Maison Notman, which had been at the heart of Montreal’s relatively emerging technology startup sector for a decade.
Notman House, run by a non-profit organization struggling to pay its mortgage, recently went up for sale. One organization official lamented the provincial government’s change of heart, which seemed to prefer investing in a new business incubator. start-up associated with the ETS, south of the city center, to the detriment of the heritage building on Sherbrooke Street.
The Notman House could now change its vocation and become a “House of Philanthropy,” which will permanently close the most recent chapter in the evolution of Quebec technologies.