Innovation Minister Navdeep Bains criticized Ontario’s funding reductions to MaRS, Invest Ottawa and Communitech. “I’m really sad to see these cuts; they’re wrongheaded and they undermine our economic growth and job-creation agenda,” Bains told The Logic at the Collision Conference. He cited the high quality of artificial intelligence research from the Canadian Institute For Advanced Research (CIFAR) and Vector—which saw $24 million in funding cuts between them—as a reason for more potential funding for these institutes. “We’ll see what we can do going forward with them. Because we want to see some of that incredible talent remain in Canada. The Geoffrey Hintons, the Yoshua Bengios, the Richard Suttons all came from CIFAR. So why would we want to undermine our leadership role? Why would we want to undermine all the investments we’ve [made] in AI? We will continue to make investments, but we will look at everything on a case-by-case basis.” (The Logic)

Talking point: The minister would not respond directly when asked if the government was corresponding with Vector or CIFAR. In April, the federal government stepped in with $52.4 million for MaRS, Invest Ottawa and Communitech just before the institutions saw provincial funding cuts. Both the provincial and federal governments say tech is an important economic sector for them, but the two are increasingly at loggerheads over the best way to support it. That’s in sharp contrast to the first few years of Justin Trudeau’s government, when Ontario and the federal government would regularly co-invest in projects.

There will be 115 scholarships available to students pursuing an AI-related master’s degree between 2019 to 2020. Students can either be working in core technical AI fields, such as deep learning, or related programs like business and healthcare. (BetaKit)

Talking point: The non-profit Vector Institute secured $135 million in public and private money to launch its hub in 2017, which aims to support research in AI. Vector Institute has comparable hubs across Canada, like the Alberta Machine Intelligence Institute and the Montreal Institute for Learning Algorithms. Canada already has the third-most AI researchers in the world, but with a growing number of them founding companies—185 in the past three years alone—there’s an increasing need for talent. Vector isn’t the only one trying to fill this gap. From the private sector, RBC is also working on proprietary AI research through its Borealis AI lab; the bank launched its own graduate fellowship program early last year.

Only 16 per cent of businesses in Canada use artificial intelligence, according to a report from Deloitte. Of the non-adopters, just one in 10 said they were likely to integrate AI into their businesses in the next five years. (The Logic)

Talking point: Canada lags behind its international peers on AI adoption, with abstainers blaming the cost of adoption, as well as staff and executives’ limited understanding of the technology. The disconnect between the country’s R&D clout in the sector and commercial use of the technology means not only that local businesses may be surrendering a competitive advantage to international rivals, but that well-funded research centres like the Vector Institute and the Montreal Institute for Learning Algorithms may face a dearth of domestic customers for their technologies—potentially driving AI companies to scale their businesses outside Canada.

FedDev Ontario and Rogers Communications are both providing $10 million in funding for the Brampton, Ont.-based facility, with the municipal government and Royal Bank of Canada contributing $5 million each. The Rogers Cybersecure Catalyst will provide training to government and private-sector workers on cybersecurity, host a cybersecurity accelerator and match academics with companies for R&D partnerships. (The Logic)

Talking point: The Ontario provincial government is notably absent from the funding announcement. In April 2018, Ryerson announced that a cybersecurity centre would be part of its planned Brampton campus. But in October, the new Progressive Conservative provincial government cancelled the previous Liberal government’s $90-million pledge for the satellite site. Recently, the federal government has stepped in to provide funding to Ontario innovation projects that the provincial level has reduced its support to. In April, Ottawa announced $52.4 million for MaRS, Communitech and Invest Ottawa; Ontario’s funding cuts to those innovation hubs were revealed shortly after. And, in May, Innovation Minister Navdeep Bains told my colleague Jessica that the federal government would look into additional funding for the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research and the Vector Institute following Ontario’s cuts to their funding.

Small Business Enterprise Centres give entrepreneurs resources like consultants and guidance on permits to build their businesses. The cuts affect programming at the 47 centres across the province, including the Starter Company Plus program, which gives small businesses up to $5,000 in grants. The Summer Company program—which provides up to $3,000 in grants to high school, college and university students running summer businesses—will also have its funding cut. (Globe and Mail)

Talking point: This is the second provincial funding cut affecting the tech sector this week. On Tuesday, Ontario cut $24 million in funding for artificial intelligence research at the Vector Institute and the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research. The government has been cutting funding to incubators and accelerators throughout the month; in early May, The Logic reported that Communitech laid off 15 per cent of its staff in response to funding cuts, while The Globe and Mail reported that the Ontario Centres of Excellence would also be affected. During the Collision Conference in Toronto on Tuesday, tech entrepreneurs in the audience booed Premier Doug Ford in protest.