Opinion

In the last column I wrote, I talked about the conundrum faced by government policy makers as they attempt to craft programs to help the entrepreneurial space sector.  One of the major dilemmas that they face is that all entrepreneurial companies depend on private investment to survive, succeed and grow.  Helping those companies means being prepared to help investors.

In this column I am going to take a slightly different viewpoint than my last two. In the last two columns I provide what I think is sound advice to founders of small businesses on how to deal with customers. In the last column I specifically singled out government customers.

On Wednesday, November 22, 2023 the Honourable François-Philippe Champagne, Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry announced mission assignments for astronauts Joshua Kutryk and Jenni Gibbons. Here’s what wasn’t said.

This is another of my columns under the general heading of “advice to founders.” It’s kind of an extension of the last one, but this time dealing with how to deal with the government.

This is one of what I hope will be a series of columns under the general heading of “Advice to Founders.” These are topics that I find I come back to often in my conversations with founders of small businesses and which I think are things that anyone who has, or is thinking about, founding a business should know.

In my work with companies in the space sector I am increasingly seeing what I think is a serious issue that is impairing the growth of companies that seem to have all the factors in place to be successful.

India joins China as the only two nations to have landers successfully land and operate on the Moon in the 21st century. Others, Israel, Japan and Russia have all failed, proving how difficult the task is at the moment.

Over the past few years the space industry has been undergoing a disruptive change.  This has been, and is, an interesting experience for those of us who have worked in the industry for some time. Because there is (or was) a funny paradox about the space business that while what we did in space was constantly changing and presenting new challenges and opportunities, how we did those things had …

If space is so central to Canada’s economy and a driver of economic growth during the pandemic, why is it that the Space Advisory Board is dormant and that Canada hasn’t taken the next logical step and create a National Space Council similar to that of the U.S.?

In an opinion published in the Hill Times today, MDA CEO Mike Greenley is out to remind the government and the political class that space is not only an engine for Canada’s economy now, but also for its recovery during this pandemic and the future.