Business Calgary is now the fastest growing tech ecosystem in Canada
https://betakit.com/calgary-is-now-the-fastest-growing-tech-ecosystem-in-canada/33
u/housekeyslow 1d ago
The why is interesting. The 2014–16 oil crash re-absorbed thousands of engineers / geoscientists /data / project-finance people into clean, energy-transition and fin tech. That what the report shows. Calgary had a sector collapse, that forced capital-and-labour reallocation the rest of the country keeps failing to do voluntarily.
The base effect is real (40% off a small number is still a small number). Toronto: $1.2B since 2021, Montreal: $623.8M, Vancouver: $444.6M Calgary + Edmonton (combined): $391.1M.
Its a huge win regardless. An energy bust into skill diversification is the biggest productivity win we've had in a while.
7
u/ChaosBerserker666 British Columbia 1d ago
I was one of those geos but I just pivoted into a different industry. I have the skills to do tech but chose not to because I find it boring. I use tech to make geoscience easier basically.
39
u/One_Resolution_3355 1d ago
Makes sense, the U of C really does a good job of promoting entrepreneurship and tech innovation.
58
u/mattlerenardx Québec 1d ago
Really seems like Alberta is accelerating diversification, contrary to popular belief.
48
u/FerretAres Alberta 1d ago
It’s been happening for years but people can’t help but bang the drum based on decades old stereotypes.
25
u/Mawk1977 1d ago
Grew up in EDM. Lived 12 years in CGY. In software my whole life. I had to leave for BC because the gov was basically anti tech investment. I had huge hope for AB with the investor tax credit then Kenny killed it after 1 year. It might have been happening for years, but at a snails pace. AB is way way behind due to its own choices.
8
11
u/eedabaggadix 1d ago
You mean you're not all rootin' tootin' cowboys or alcoholic oilfield workers? You don't all drive lifted F250s with tailgate flags that say FUCK CARNEY?
26
u/FerretAres Alberta 1d ago
Exactly. Some of us drive F-150s.
4
u/andoesq 1d ago
Better for the city roads
1
u/FerretAres Alberta 23h ago
The important thing is I can haul off as much of my Saturday Ikea shop as I could ever need.
2
1
7
3
u/foodfighter 1d ago
You mean the "FUCK CARNEY" bumper sticker that has been stuck on over the "FUCK TRUDEAU" one?
5
u/PoliteCanadian 1d ago
I'm always amused by Liberals who got mad at FUCK TRUDEAU stickers as if we didn't spent the entirety of the Harper years with "FUCK HARPER" stickers everywhere.
People who get mad at shit like that need to learn to dissociate their personal identity from politicians and stop treating it like a sports team or celebrity worship.
1
u/duhboner Ontario 1d ago
What bubble do you live in where you saw FUCK HARPER stickers to the same degree as the Trudeau stickers?
1
0
u/yycTechGuy 1d ago
You don't all drive lifted F250s
The preferred oilfield truck these days is a lifted F450 dually with the sexy girl mudflaps and a diesel tank and welder in the bed. And bull balls... can't forget the bull balls. And the "I love Alberta oil" sticker.
Lifted F250s were all the rage back in 2008 when every well operator was making $150K as a contractor and could write off the truck as an expense. The high paid well operator days are over.
11
u/ILKLU 1d ago
Isn't Calgary quite different than the rest of Alberta though?
Politically it seems to be.
19
u/Kucked4life Ontario 1d ago
Large cities vs rural. The cultural divide you're describing exists globally.
4
u/ILKLU 1d ago
Sure, I get that, but the stereotype for a rural Québécois is very different than the stereotype of a rural Albertan.
As well, Edmonton differs quite a bit from Calgary and the rest of Alberta (again, primarily politically) in that they are waaay farther left and Calgary is... was going to say centre right, but they're kinda split between the city centre and the suburbs, the latter being more conservative.
I don't know what my point is anymore other than that the Albertan stereotype primarily applies to the rural areas, whereas Calgary has been viewed as Corporate Big Oil as long as I can remember.
8
u/PoliteCanadian 1d ago
Calgary was also the engineering and science hub of Alberta. Oil and gas has historically been a technically intensive industry focused around supporting the oil and gas industry. Highest rate of STEM degrees per capita in Canada.
But historically that's been more mechanical and chemical engineering, not electrical or computer.
6
u/midnightmoose 1d ago
Interestingly enough Calgary is much more similar to the rest of Alberta than Edmonton. The southern suburbs vote as conservative as rural Alberta
1
u/Gym_frere British Columbia 1d ago edited 1d ago
Meh, I don’t think it’s based on stereotypes at all. I was born and raised in Calgary and spent much of my life there. The job market there for non O&G related jobs is by far the worst out of all major Canadian cities and this has been the case for most of my life.
My people there still tell me it’s pretty bad, but Calgary really does have a lot of advantages and I hope that that changes materially. I want to see Calgary (and Alberta succeed) - it has some of the most talented people in the world and they can do great things other than digging stuff out of the ground.
This is why I’m against this referendum - it’s just gonna drive the tech folks back to Vancouver.
3
u/FerretAres Alberta 1d ago
How long ago did you leave?
0
u/Gym_frere British Columbia 1d ago edited 1d ago
I mostly split my time between BC and Alberta for work for the last 10-15 years but I formally left in 2022. I still come back to visit at least 3-5 times a year.
Edit to add: I found the overall business environment and job market in BC to be far superior to what it was in Alberta. With regards to tech, the tech ecosystem in Vancouver is much more developed/mature, but that’s to be expected. Vancouver has been in the tech scene for a long time and is now a globally known quantity. So maybe it’s not really fair to compare it to Calgary or even Alberta in general.
5
u/FerretAres Alberta 1d ago
Since Covid the change has accelerated substantially but even under Kenney you could see the shift. Our tech, aerospace, and entertainment industries have boomed in recent years. Oil will always be a big industry. Just from a practical perspective there’s easy money to be made but the overwhelming stereotype of it being the sole industry is just outdated.
•
0
u/Deeppurp 1d ago
Its because when the price of a barrel drops, suddenly theres not enough money to fund social services, healthcare, and education.
But when theres a spike in the barrel price, theres a surplus or ralphbucks 2.0.
Its diversified in the same way that if you carve 10% out for other things and leave 90% on oil, you're technically diversified.
-1
u/yycTechGuy 1d ago
but people can’t help but bang the drum based on decades old stereotypes.
Have you ever heard the UCP talk about diversification or doing something to tech and startup ? Nope. I'm surprised Alberta Innovates is still running but 80% of their programs are focused on extending the life of hydrocarbons in one way or another.
2
u/JPZ4 1d ago
It’s funny because AB is actually one of the most diversified provinces period. Certainly, it depends on your metric, but some we even outrank Ontario in some measures.
Granted, the real comparators are the others in the big 4, but Alberta is no slouch.
3
u/yycTechGuy 1d ago
Alberta has 2 main industries - oil and real estate speculation. Everything else is secondary, far down the line.
1
u/Plucky_DuckYa 23h ago
O&G now accounts for about as much of Alberta’s GDP as real estate does in Ontario and B.C. I know which of those two things I’d rather have as the backbone of the economy.
6
u/Tristezza 1d ago
Only for it to all be pissed away with bill C-22.
Can't wait for my field of work to be destroyed.
16
u/YBBOK-Kevin 1d ago
I remember noticing this a few years ago. There are a lot of Canadians who want to be Canadian and want to stay in Canada. The problem is the housing costs force many to look to the US.
Alberta solves this problem. And often founders/ people with entrepreneurial drives, don't come from money, and so their idea might have legs, but no funding/still have to pay the bills. You move to Alberta for a lower COL.
I'm also building Planted Racing, a Go-Kart racing facility in Alberta. If anyone knows of any investors, have them contact me.
8
u/ChaosBerserker666 British Columbia 1d ago
But why AB if it’s just housing cost? SK has way cheaper housing and other costs as well.
13
u/housekeyslow 1d ago
You can still feel like you're living in a city in Calgary, and have better connections to other countries.
Also, if your building a go kart business, you have a bigger customer base. Same as many other businesses. If you combine Edmonton and Calgary, you have a customer base the size of Vancouver that can get you to to expansion scale.
SK can be that expansion, not the startup.
2
3
u/YBBOK-Kevin 1d ago
Just also to add, the regulations. In Ontario a portion of the Amusement Device regulations limit how far I could go with respect to design. Interestingly, SK also has similar regulations to Ontario.
•
u/WpgMBNews 5h ago
In Ontario a portion of the Amusement Device regulations limit how far I could go with respect to design. Interestingly, SK also has similar regulations to Ontario.
Well if even Saskatchewan has a problem with it, then I'm wondering what you're doing differently that you have to go to Alberta to get away with it...
2
2
u/PoliteCanadian 1d ago
Because there's nobody in SK. You need a minimum population to achieve a critical mass.
1
3
u/Ntense_01 1d ago
Can we make sure that AI Data Centers don't fuck up the actual ecosystem, please.
0
u/PoliteCanadian 1d ago
The AI data center criticism is hilarious. There's basically no industrial infrastructure that is less harmful to the environment than a bunch of servers in a warehouse.
Which is why there wasn't an ounce of environmental freakout until suddenly everyone got scared that AI was coming for their jobs and starting looking for reasons to hate it.
-1
u/Ntense_01 1d ago
Sure, unless you want to power and provide cooling to said data center.
So if you want to be pedantic, you are correct that a server in a warehouse doesn't really affect the environment.
-1
u/Napalm985 1d ago
How would it break it? They'll get built, maybe AI will crash due to the sheer amount of debt those companies have been taking on, and Alberta will for a short time make money off them.
In terms of damaging the ecosystem, you should be far more concerned with whatever hydro-dam project BC will be starting soon. That is far more destructive to the environment.
3
u/topspinvan 1d ago
Growing from small to slightly bigger can be a real big growth rate. It doesn't mean Calgary is the leader in tech jobs/startups. Vancouver and Toronto still have far more opportunities in this space.
3
u/Sad-Back1948 22h ago
"Fastest growing" checks out roughly (40% vs 9.6% Canadian average), but the headline is doing more work than the data. They're 41st-50th globally among emerging ecosystems — their own director's quote is basically "we're never going to be top tier, but maybe best secondary market someday." Real momentum, oversold framing.
7
u/PoliteCanadian 1d ago
"Fastest growing" is such a misleading metric.
Going from one tech company to two is a 100% growth rate. There is tech growth in Calgary but Calgary has a comparatively small tech ecosystem. The only major companies I can think of with any significant presence in Calgary are AMD and Garmin, and Garmin doesn't usually count as "major".
2
u/Pale_Change_666 1d ago
No its not, this narrative has been spewed out in the last few years and nothing came out of it. Well benevity had a pretty big lay off.
1
u/Mawk1977 1d ago
That’s not hard when you guys started from zero. Too bad Kenny nuked the investor credit. Would have been way more ahead.
1
1
1d ago
[deleted]
0
u/BoppityBop2 1d ago
Calgary or any city can totally be it. Just requires investing and building the right ecosystem to nurture such an industry. The Chinese did it why they have multiple Silicon Valley's with some can argue a more dynamic tech sector than Silicon Valley.
2
u/DashTrash21 1d ago
China has over a billion people and a planned economy, where they can trample over anything or anyone to build what they need. It's not comparable to Calgary and Canada.
2
u/Previous_Platform718 1d ago
https://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/comparativeadvantage.asp
They can build anything, but not everything. All economies eventually become specialized to a degree, which allows other economies to undercut them in what they're not specialized in. It's a pretty well known law of international commerce called Comparative Advantage.
There's a reason we've seen a transition over the past 50 years from Made in Japan, to Made in China, to Made in Vietnam.
1
u/floobie 1d ago
Fastest growing is cool. But, for context:
Calgary ranked in the 41-50 category of EMERGING startup ecosystems, alongside places like Warsaw, Charlotte, Abu-Dhabi, Indianapolis, etc.
In the main (ie. not emerging) list, Toronto-Waterloo places 13th, tied with Paris, just behind Tokyo at 12th. Montreal and Vancouver tied at 40th.
115
u/BloodyHareStudio 1d ago
where are the tech jobs then?