By Lawson Hunter
On July 3, the Hon. Karina Gould, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons and MP for Burlington, announced $8.5 million to be awarded to six Halton and Hamilton businesses in an effort to support new endeavours and expanded capabilities in the artificial intelligence, electric vehicle, manufacturing, aerospace, and life science sectors.
The announcement was made on behalf of the Honourable Filomena Tassi, the minister responsible for the Federal Economic Development Agency for Southern Ontario (FedDev Ontario).
Gould stated, “This region is recognized as one of the most dynamic and fast growing regions in North America. The Halton/Hamilton area is known for its advanced manufacturing, technology, and life science sectors. All of the businesses represented here today are working hard to ensure that these sectors are strong and at the cutting edge of innovation.”
“The Government of Canada, through FedDev Ontario, is pleased to be supporting six businesses in the region that are scaling up, increasing manufacturing capabilities, improving support for critical sectors, and creating skilled jobs.”
The event took place at the Canadian headquarters of n!Biomachines (pronounced “n-factorial Biomachines”), one of the recipient companies.
n!Biomachines, formerly known as The Cultivated B Canada, plans to use the federal government’s $1,250,000 to scale up and improve productivity at its bioreactor manufacturing facility in Burlington to produce bioreactors in larger sizes and quantities. This will help other Canadian and global businesses in the emerging cellular agricultural industry.
n!Biomachines’ parent company, The Cultivated B, is a multinational corporation based in Germany, dedicated to the development and application of breakthrough technologies in cellular agriculture, precision fermentation, and bioreactor engineering to enable scalable commercialization of the cellular-agriculture industry.
n!Biomachines delivers affordable, easy-to-operate systems for the food, dietary supplement, and cosmetics industries, offering sustainable solutions that consume low amounts of electricity — in some cases, as low as 150 watts.
Minister Gould, after touring the North Service Road facility, said, “I toured here a year ago when all you had was an empty building and a dream and a vision of what was going to be here. Today, it’s exciting to see this become a world-class, world-leading facility for bioreactors, a cutting-edge technology that’s being developed right here in Burlington.”
Bioreactors are laboratory- to industrial-sized systems, designed to support and control the growth of biological organisms at food-grade or pharmaceutical levels that may be treated further in order to get isolated compounds such as proteins.
Thomas Bailey, V.P. of Operations for n!Biomachines, welcomed Minister Gould and said, “With this funding announcement, it will allow us to scale up our manufacturing, to further grow our team, and to bring new technologies to Canadian companies and using Canadian-created innovations, not just here but globally as well.”
According to the federal government’s website, the other companies receiving FedDev Ontario loans were:
Aethon Aerial Solutions Inc. of Burlington ($2.5 million) is developing the next generation of AI and machine learning aerial camera systems for infrastructure asset inspections that can be used with helicopters and drones. This repayable investment is part of a $5-million project.
GL Chemtec International Ltd. of Oakville ($750,000) is establishing a Good Manufacturing
Practice (GMP)-certified production space in Oakville to produce Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (API) for drug discovery, delivery, and development in clinical trials. This repayable investment is part of a $1.5-million project.
JFE Shoji Power Canada Inc. of Burlington ($1 million) is strengthening and expanding capacity at
its Burlington facility to supply electrical steel and manufactured core components for the production of electric motors, ZEV powertrains, and power transformers through the addition of a new transformer core cutting line. The new line will assist JFE in meeting the growing demands of electrification. This repayable investment is part of an over $5.7-million project.
Merq Automation Inc. of Hamilton ($235,000) is increasing production capacity and efficiency by establishing its own bottling line of sterile dehydrated bacterial powders used for microbiological testing in the agri-food industry.
M & G Steel Ltd. of Oakville ($2.8 million) is expanding its capacity to manufacture structural steel solutions in its Oakville facility by adopting advanced equipment to enhance productivity. It will also
use a new production line to reduce both manufacturing time and waste, expand into international markets and create jobs in the region. This repayable investment is part of an over $14.9-million project.
