(AlbertaIndex, June 13, Friday) --- In addition to oil and the US, Alberta’s economic future will have two new components: Asia and high technology.

       In recent weeks, the Alberta government has announced plans to develop ties with Asia and to build up hi-tech entrepreneurship in the province.

From June 13-23, a high-powered delegation led by Deputy Premier Ron Stevens will visit Asian powerhouses Japan, South Korea and China to “build relationships and gain insights that will be valuable for developing a new international strategy.”

Stevens, also Minister of International and Intergovernmental Relations, will focus on growing trade and investment with three of Alberta’s most significant trading partners. The three Northeast Asian countries together represent 43 per cent of Alberta’s total non-US exports. Last year, they bought a total of $4.7 billion of merchandise from Alberta businesses.

Alberta has huge potential to sharply increase exports to Asia’s fast growing resource-poor economies. China is also a huge market for Alberta’s high technology exports, in particular, the agricultural sector.

“With more than $90 billion in exports and growing, our population of just about three-and-a-half million people is clearly pulling much more than its international weight,” said Stevens. “However, we are facing increased global competition. We need to build on our successes because being a key player in today’s global market is not a luxury for Alberta, it’s a must.”

Stevens and Alberta business leaders will meet senior executives at some of Asia’s leading corporations including Hitachi, INPEX, Korea National Oil Corporation and the China National Offshore Oil Corporation. The delegation will also meet political leaders from the Korean and Chinese governments to discuss opportunities for immigration to labour-scarce Alberta.

Stevens will also meet with Canadian Embassy officials to talk about federal and provincial trade and investment priorities.

During his mission, he will learn how Alberta’s offices in Asia operate. The offices in Tokyo, Seoul and two in Beijing are part of Alberta’s international office network, which includes six other offices in various global locations. Alberta’s international offices are integral to developing strong international relations and enhancing trade and investment growth for Alberta.

While Stevens is helping to develop Alberta’s Asia strategy, Premier Ed Stelmach has unveiled his government’s plan to develop high tech entrepreneurship.

Increasing the number of new companies in emerging advanced technology sectors is the goal of his government’s action plan “Bringing Technology to Market.”

This $178-million plan highlights a range of coordinated actions - from a research and development tax credit to increased investment capital to technology-specific business supports and new technopreneurship projects.

“This generation of Albertans has a unique opportunity to build for tomorrow, and an important part of that must be ensuring that ideas and innovations developed in our province are commercialized in our province,” said Premier Stelmach.

“For the next generation economy, we’re tapping into the resource that never depletes - knowledge.  Our broad range of actions will ensure Alberta is well situated in the global knowledge-based economy and will create opportunities for generations to come.”

The three-year action plan, builds on Alberta’s base of world-class research excellence, abundant natural and human resources, and technology commercialization agencies and programs to create a dynamic culture that attracts global business and venture capital expertise to Alberta. The plan combines recommendations from the Value-Added and Technology Commercialization Task Force report as well as other reports and strategies.  

Leading the province’s high tech business efforts, Doug Horner, Minister of Advanced Education and Technology, said:

“We’re building on our success to create an environment where technopreneurs thrive and new companies grow quickly, producing technologies and products that are successful in global markets.  This plan focuses on the right mix of environment, support mechanisms and incentives for our high-tech entrepreneurs to break through in global markets with the next big idea.”

Art Monk, one of the advisory panel members to the task force said, “Getting a return on innovation in global markets is all about commercialization - the transformation of research discoveries into valuable market-driving products and services.”

Monk, who is COO of Inflexion Point, an intellectual property investment bank based in Palo Alto, California, added:

“This plan is a positive stimulus to Alberta’s innovation ecosystem at all levels.  Once up and running, it basically means early-stage technology-based companies will have little reason to leave the province to succeed.  They can reach out globally from a solid Alberta base that has a mandate to establish financial and technology linkages worldwide.”

Planned actions include implementation of a provincial science and research experimental development tax credit, improved access to early stage seed and venture capital support, strengthened access to regional business services, introduction of technology development advisors, implementation of innovation vouchers, enhancements to product development centres, creation of a demonstration fund, and initiation of a youth technopreneurship project.

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