RIM announced yesterday that it would be opening a support facility in Halifax Regional Municipality, creating over 1000 jobs, most of them paying (according to reports) around 40-50K per year. That’s 50 million in wages, more or less. Quite a shot for the economy of the region.
More important (in my opinion) is the possibility the new facility will act as a catalyst for additional growth for technology based companies in Nova Scotia and Atlantic Canada. Taken in combination with the announcement last Thursday that Keata Pharma Inc. is opening a pharmaceutical manufacturing plant in Cape Breton (to employ 165 persons within 3 years) together with the fact that one of the proposals put forward by the Premier’s Advisory Council on Innovation - being the increase of the SR & D tax credit from 15 percent to 40 - one could be forgiven for feeling more optimistic about the prospects for the technology economy in this region.
The proposal to increase the SR & D tax credit is exciting. As the report notes, “[Building improved business R & D capacity … is a key innovation and commercialization challenge.” Further, the fact that the increased credit, if it is approved, will be the highest in Canada should send a message that Nova Scotia is taking the knowledge economy seriously (at long last).
Note: The SR & D tax credit helps companies offset the costs of research and development by refunding a percentage of permitted costs, including wages. Unfortunately, not enough companies utilize the resource for a variety of reasons. They should really re-consider, regardless of whether the credit goes up or otherwise. As said by J.P. Deveau of Acadian Seaplants in a recent Chronicle Herald article, “This change - this enhanced tax credit – would allow us to increase our investment in R & D which would result in improved technology, enabling our company to be more productive and therefore more competitive.”
Posted by: |