Dr. Jaspinder Komal – Full speech

Merci Philippe.

And welcome, everyone.

I joined DRDC shortly before the first ever IDEaS Marketplace event last year.

I have to say, I was very impressed.

It did not look like your typical “government” event.

42 companies presented their solutions.

Over 400 stakeholders attended.

And we saw the promise of technologies new to the defence sphere.

When I look around at today’s event, as I did last year, I get to see what IDEaS truly represents.

And that is opportunity.

The opportunity to network. The opportunity to partner.

The opportunity to help the Canadian Armed Forces meet their current and future needs.

The opportunity to find like-minded individuals, companies and organizations to help push your technology to its full potential.

IDEaS was always about more than just funding – it is about building a stronger defence innovation ecosystem.

And this takes efforts like IDEaS Marketplace to continue to build these important connections.

IDEaS has been finding and shaping concepts and technology that fit the CAF’s needs for five years now.

We are just now seeing the fruition of hard work, funding and expertise that has culminated in 20 potential candidates for DND/CAF to “Test Drive” their tech.

Test Drives are the final stage in the IDEaS continuum. Which means that they are close to being ready for use.

Currently, there are several test drives in progress or completed.

A Test Drive of a cyber-protection platform has been completed. It was developed by Sapper Labs, and is capable of identifying the perpetrators of sophisticated cyber threats.

A second Test Drive is being conducted with Ecopia, which will use artificial intelligence and mapping technology to detect and classify objects of interest.

And finally, Terra sense Analytics will be looking at better ways to monitor and interpret Full Motion Video.

The Green Heat test drive is testing a low carbon energy generation system to heat existing DND/CAF buildings.

On top of this, IDEaS will be hosting its third Countering Uncrewed Aerial Systems sandbox in the spring of 2024.

These demonstration events help to refine technology to detect and defeat drones, as well as bring new technologies forward.

To stay ahead of the curve, we are funding research clusters to find novel defence applications to emerging technologies such as 5G and quantum computing, sensing and communications.

And that’s on top of the research recently completed on advanced materials and autonomous systems, which are being featured today.

IDEaS has even more technology in store for you today.

Today’s event features challenges and solutions from IDEaS second and third calls for proposals.

Advances in materials research. Building trust in autonomous systems. Cyber. Big data. Video surveillance. It all culminates in integrating these systems into combat operations.

And to speak to this, we have Rear Amiral Jeffery Zwick, Chief of Combat Systems Integration, Vice Chief of Defence Staff, who will be speaking about these critical pieces to our defence infrastructure, at 11:00.

IDEaS’ expertise and funding mechanisms were also used to launch four COVID-19 challenges issued during the pandemic, and these technologies are being showcased here as well.

In fact, GermstopSQ, the world’s first surface sanitizer that continues to kill bacteria and viruses for 24 hours after being applied, just recently received approval by Health Canada for sale. So congratulations to EnvisionSQ for this momentous accomplishment!

And the turnout for this event is even bigger than last year. Which means that we have continued interest from both industry and government in the solutions that we have funded.

Thank you for coming and I look forward to seeing your presentations, demonstrations and meeting your face to face.