Today, the Honourable Bill Blair, Minister of National Defence; the Honourable Bardish Chagger, Member of Parliament for Waterloo; Andy Fillmore, Member of Parliament for Halifax; and Darren Fisher, Member of Parliament for Dartmouth-Cole Harbour congratulated two Canadian accelerators and 13 test centres that have joined the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Defence Innovation Accelerator for the North Atlantic (DIANA) network.
As announced in 2022, NATO DIANA is coming to Canada, with its North American Regional Office finding a home in Halifax.
The NATO DIANA Regional Office in Canada is expected to bring tangible benefits to Canadian industry and the defence technology sector. With a thriving innovation ecosystem, sustaining more than 300 entrepreneurial science and technology start-ups, the Halifax Regional Municipality is also home to several major universities and research centres as well as Canada's Atlantic naval fleet.
NATO DIANA unites the best and brightest innovators from across the Alliance and provides deep tech and dual-use innovators with access to NATO resources.
DIANA focuses on deep tech and dual-use technologies that have both civilian and military uses. It will help facilitate cooperation between military operators and the Alliance's start-ups, scientific researchers, and technology companies to help NATO maintain its technological edge over the threats posed by emerging technologies.
DIANA supports companies with training, funding, commercial advice, and access to defence expertise and investors. Through competitive challenges, selected innovators can receive grant funding, acceleration advice, and access to the NATO DIANA network of accelerators and test centres.
The new accelerator sites and test centres will augment DIANA's capacity to support innovators from across the Alliance as they develop their technologies. DIANA-affiliated accelerators deliver world-class programming to companies in the programme, while the network of test centres provides access to cutting-edge testing facilities. These are available to DIANA's current cohort of companies, as well as those DIANA will support in future, giving them expert advice and access to test and try their technologies in specialised environments.
The Canadian accelerators and test centres that are now part of the growing DIANA footprint are:
Accelerators:
- Communitech - Waterloo, Ontario
- COVE - Dartmouth, Nova Scotia
Test centres:
- The Launch, Fisheries and Marine Institute of Memorial University - St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador
- ACE Climatic Aerodynamic Wind Tunnel and Core Research Facility - Ontario Tech University Canada - Oshawa, Ontario
- University of Alberta - Edmonton, Alberta
- Area X.O. - Ottawa, Ontario
- Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization (VIDO) / University of Saskatchewan - Saskatoon, Saskatchewan
- Testing Network - Mohawk College, Saskatchewan Polytechnic, 3 Points in Space Media, SubZero North - Saskatoon, Saskatchewan / Hamilton, Ontario
- Southern Alberta Institute of Technology (SAIT) - Centre for Innovation and Research in Advanced Manufacturing and Materials (CIRAMM) - Calgary, Alberta
- Centre technologique en aérospatiale (CTA) - St-Hubert, Québec
- Aerospace Research Centre, National Research Council Canada - Ottawa, Ontario
- Automotive and Surface Transportation Research Centre, National Research Council Canada - Ottawa, Ontario / Boucherville, Québec
- Digital Technologies Research Centre, National Research Council Canada - Ottawa, Ontario
- Ocean, Coastal and River Engineering Research Centre, National Research Council Canada - St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador / Ottawa, Ontario
- Canadian Photonics Fabrication Centre, National Research Council Canada - Ottawa, Ontario
The Canadian additions to the NATO DIANA network will enable innovators from across the Alliance to access Canada's cutting-edge facilities and collaborate on emerging technology to jointly help solve NATO's defence and security challenges.
