CANADA'S BEST MANAGED COMPANIES 2022

JUNE 2022

CANADA’SBESTMANAGEDCOMPANIES2022

INCLUDINGMASTERMIND TOYSAND ITS NEON RAINBOWPLAYGROUND BALL

THE NEW SPACE RACE:TELESAT VS. THE RICHEST

MEN ON THE PLANET

FOR SHEERTEX FOUNDERKATHERINE HOMUTH,IGNORANCE IS BLISS

167 YEARS,FIVE GENERATIONS,

ZERO FAMILY DRAMA

TAKE THAT VACATION—YOUR LIFE MIGHT

DEPEND ON IT

JUNE 2022 / REPORT ON BUSINESS 1

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Contents

2 EDITOR’S NOTE

7 NEW RULESThe evidence is clear:Taking vacation is alife-or-death decision.Choose life

8 EXCHANGECenovus CEO AlexPourbaix believes it’spossible to satisfythe world’s renewedappetite for oil and gasand close in on net zero

12 BIG IDEAAre tax-free capitalgains on principalresidences an unfairsubsidy to homeowners?Here’s where economictheory collides withpolitical reality

16 WHAT YOU CANLEARN FROMThe Weeknd is nolonger an enigma, but hestill carefully manageshis image. That’s howyou become a megastar

18 DECODERCOVID-19 was acataclysm, so why didmarkets rebound fasterthan after just about anyother debacle in recentdecades?

20 FOR YOURCONSIDERATIONCanada’s largest coalexport terminal stillgenerates big profits.Plus, crypto is here tostay, and the industrywants regulation

22 SMART MONEYMackenzie’s BenoitGervais has figured outhow to make resourcefunds ESG-friendly andmake money

80 TURNING POINTRacism is a very realobstacle for Blackentrepreneurs. ForDonovan Bailey, the bestway to overcome it is tokeep pursuing success

72BLOOD, SWEAT AND SHEERSMontreal startup SheertexHoldings is seeking a holy grail:unbreakable sheer pantyhose.And it’s already got a product,a game plan and fast-growingsales. /By Sean Silcoff

60SPACE: THE FINAL FRONTIERTelesat is betting big on low-Earth-orbit satellites to deliverhigh-speed internet. But so areits most aggressive rivals—twoof which are led by the world’srichest men. /By Jason Kirby

28 NERVES OF STEELCanada’s family-controlled firms are renowned for somespectacular blow-ups. So how is Samuel, Son & Co. stillthriving after five generations? /By Joe Castaldo

38 MEET THE NEW SCHOOLLessons from the latest crop of Best ManagedCompanies and a look at the cool stuff they make./By Liza Agrba, Nicolas Van Praet and Jaime Weinman

50 STILL THE BESTThe list of 452 returning companies, from two-yearhonourees to the seven-years-plus Platinum Club.

CANADA’S BEST MANAGED COMPANIES

An antenna at Telesat’soutpost in Hanover, Ont.,communicates with thecompany’s lone LEOdemonstration satellite

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Editor’s Note

June 2022, Volume 38, No. 7EditorialEditor DAWN CALLEJASenior Editor JOHN DALYEditors-at-Large JOE CASTALDO,JASON KIRBY, TAMAR SATOVCopy Editor SUSAN NERBERGResearch MARTHA BEACH, MAHDISHABIBINIA, EMILY LATIMER, CAROLYNPIORO, ALLAN TONG, ADRIENNE WEISS

ArtArt Director DOMENIC MACRIAssociate Art DirectorBRENNAN HIGGINBOTHAMDirector of PhotographyCLARE VANDER MEERSCH

ContributorsLIZA AGRBA, TREVOR COLE, FIONACOLLIE, ROSEMARY COUNTER, RITATRICHUR, NICOLAS VAN PRAET,KATIE UNDERWOOD

AdvertisingChief Revenue OfficerANDREW SAUNDERSManaging Director, Creative Studiosand Ad InnovationTRACY DAYSenior Manager, Special ProductsANDREA D’ANDRADEProduct ManagerRYAN HYSTEAD

ProductionVice President, Print OperationsSALLY PIRRIProduction Co-ordinatorISABELLE CABRAL

PublisherPHILLIP CRAWLEYEditor-in-Chief, The Globe and MailDAVID WALMSLEYManaging Director, Businessand Financial ProductsGARTH THOMASEditor, Report on BusinessGARY SALEWICZ

Report on Business magazine ispublished 7 times a year by The Globeand Mail Inc., 351 King Street E., TorontoM5A 0N1. Telephone 416-585-5000.Letters to the Editor:[email protected] 2022, The Globe and Mail.Indexed in the Canadian Periodical Index.

Advertising OfficesHead Office, The Globe and Mail,351 King Street E., Toronto M5A 0N1Telephone 416-585-5111 or toll-free1-866-999-9237Branch OfficesMontreal 514-982-3050Vancouver 604-685-0308Calgary 403-245-4987Email: [email protected]

United States and countries outside ofNorth America: AJR Media Group,212-426-5932, [email protected]

Publications mail registration No. 7418.The publisher accepts no responsibilityfor unsolicited manuscripts,transparencies or other material.Printed in Canada by TranscontinentalPrinting Inc.Report on Business magazine is electronicallyavailable through subscription to Factiva.comfrom Factiva, at factiva.com/factivaor 416-306-2003.

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2 JUNE 2022 / REPORT ON BUSINESS

By my count, I’ve helped produce more than 130issues of Report on Business since joining the mag-azine in mid-2006. And without fail, as our deadlinelooms, the staff goes into something approachingpanic: How can we possibly get everything done andto the press on time? This issue was perhaps a littlemore hair-raising than most (thanks a lot, COVID-19), but we made it, of course—we haven’t missed apress deadline in our nearly 40-year history. But thequestion always lingers: What if?

Those two words are a bit of a global theme rightnow. Uncertainty is surging worldwide, accordingto the World Uncertainty Index. It reached unprec-edented heights at the start of the pandemic in 2020,then settled down as we all adjusted to the new real-ity. But in the first quarter of this year, uncertaintyrebounded to levels not seen since the attacks ofSept. 11, 2001, and the U.K.’s Brexit vote in 2016.The war in Ukraine accounts for 40% of the cur-rent global angst—not surprising considering theintractability of Russia’s president. But there areplenty of other reasons to feel anxious: rapidly ris-ing inflation, the impact of runaway climate change,simmering tensions with China, the tide of populistunrest sweeping across Canada. Then, of course,there’s the seemingly never-ending pandemic.Who could have predicted it would last this long?And what will the long-term impacts be, not just on

the global economy, but on thehealth of the world’s citizens?

All this what-iffing is enoughto make many of us mere mortalsfreeze up and lose focus. Whichis why it’s so encouraging to readabout leaders who aren’t lettingthe hazy picture hold them back.As Jason Kirby writes in his fea-ture on Ottawa-based satelliteoperator Telesat, its future isfairly dripping with uncertaintyas it struggles to launch a con-stellation of low-Earth-orbit sat-ellites. Yet, CEO Dan Goldbergis forging ahead on the assump-tion that his team will overcomewhatever barriers the pandemic,the dangers of space and thevagaries of Elon Musk put in itspath (“Space: the final logistics-addled, billionaire-crowded,costs-skyrocketing frontier,”page 60).

The same kind of determina-tion carries Sheertex founderKather ine Homuth’s s tory(“Blood, sweat and sheers” bySean Silcoff, page 72). Though inher case, it’s her self-professedignorance of uncertainty that hashelped her stay the course. Set-ting out to make unrippable tightswhile having zero manufactur-ing or textiles experience shouldhave been impossible. Even herinvestors—heck, even her ownhusband—were skeptical. ButHomuth plunged ahead, and loyalcustomers love her for it.

One thing’s for certain: Weshould al l heed the adviceoffered up in “Give me vaca-tion or give me death” (page 7)and take some time off over thenext few months—not just fromworking, but from what-iffing,too. We’ll see you back here inOctober. /Dawn Calleja

Send feedback [email protected]

To boldly go

We are Kyndryl. We design, build, manage and modernize the

mission-critical technology systems that the world depends

on every day. Working with our customers, we imagine things

differently. Whether it’s the top 5 airlines or half of the Fortune

500, we help the world’s biggest companies realize big

ambitions and discover new ones.

Kyndryl. The Heart of Progress.™

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Flight to safetyNicolas Van Praet profiled Transat CEO Annick Guérard (“Fasten your seatbelts”) as she steers the airline through heavy turbulence.

Feedback

4 MAY 2022 / REPORT ON BUSINESS4 JUNE 2022 / REPORT ON BUSINESS

Have feedback? Email us [email protected] tweet us @robmagca

The trick for Transat will beto identify routes that areprofitable but that Air Canadaand WestJet care less about, sothey don’t defend them with theusual “search and destroy” pricecuts meant to crush competitors.—app_67669782

Would have been interested inknowing how Air Transat plansto contribute to the necessaryemission reductions—50% by2030—to prevent catastrophicplanetary heating. —polyanimic

The airline industry is tough atthe best of times. All the best inreshaping Transat in the post-COVID world. —Gene Lawrence

I wish her all the luck in theworld keeping Transat in theair. It’s my go-to airline. I wasvery sad when Air Canada wasnegotiating to buy it. Needlessto say, I am very pleased to knowthe deal fell through. —ShirleyV6

A very impressive leader, witha contemporary, feminineapproach that just may bringresults. —JJB1949

Clear and present dangerIn “The return to abnormal,” JohnLorinc wondered whether post-COVID offices will still be toxic.

This remote-work concept hasso many potential applications,we’d be insane to ignore it.Reduced overhead. Wider reachfor finding new talent. Thereduced need to stuff everyoneinto a city core. The eliminationof commutes that not only savehours of wasted time, but alsosave the environment and reducepublic costs. Honestly, you haveto wonder who the idiots areresisting all that. —Phil King

The same woke-sters who wanttheir Uber driver, barista, doctor,dentist and server to be at theirbeck and call won’t go to workthemselves. Let companiesdecide what is best for them. Thefew who quit will compete for ashrinking number of jobs fromtheir dock on whatever lake theymove to. —Takcom1

As a retiree trying to find atee time at a fully booked golfcourse, I wish some of theseyounger golfers would return totheir offices. —Stan Duptall

Hot air?Jeffrey Jones wrote aboutHydrostor’s simple storagesolution for renewable power.

Storage has always been theAchilles heel of renewables. Nostorage system will ever giveback all the energy you put intoit. The winners will be those thatdeliver back the highest ratio atthe lowest cost and (perhaps)the lowest environmentalimpact. Hydrostor sounds like astrong potential competitor.—michaelmoore

ADVISORY BOARDWhat impact is high inflationhaving on your business?

Shelby Taylor, ChickapeaIt’s particularly challengingfor brands that are consideredpremium. Because consumercosts have gone up in everyway, they feel pressure to makebudget cuts and, sadly, healthychoices tend to be one of thefirst cuts. During times of highinflation, we see people turnback to basics and lower-qualityfood choices. At the same time,inflation has caused our coststo rise dramatically—more thanwe’re comfortable passing onto our customers, which hasresulted in lower margins andless cash to operate the businesswith. Our hope is that peoplewill see our pasta for what it is: ahigh-protein meal option that’smore affordable than meat.

Todd Kelly, Love Good FatsIt hinders our ability toaggressively invest in the future.Costs have increased across theboard, and because of Canada’sconsolidated grocery industry,where retailers can restrictour ability to increase prices,margins have been squeezed.We won’t sacrifice on quality,so we’re forced to do more withless, trim investment and paymore for capital. The future isless clear than ever as we try topredict how much ingredientswill cost, how much it will costto ship products and how muchwe can charge customers, notjust next year but next month.Our investments have becomemore cautious and the need forthem to succeed more critical.

CONTRIBUTORS

Sean Silcoffwrites about tech

and innovationfor The Globe andMail. For the June

issue, he wroteabout Katherine

Homuth’s quest tomake unrippabletights (page 72).

Rita Trichur is asenior business

writer andcolumnist for ROB.

She interviewedDonovan Baileyfor this month’s

Turning Point(page 80).

DanielEhrenworth isa photographer

based in Toronto,Montreal and NYC.

He likes colour,the Muppets, his

family and jujubes.He photographedthis month’s cover

as part of theBest Managed

Companiespackage

(page 38).

CORRECTIONDue to an oversight, the 2022 Women Lead Here research did not screenfor REITs and companies listed on public markets as units. As such, theAwards and Rankings Program Team re-evaluated this sector in April2022, and as a result 10 companies have been added to the benchmark(tgam.ca/womenleadhere). The research team regrets this error.

“AJ, I am inawe of yourcourage, yourperseveranceand yourauthenticity.”—Kura1 on our cover storyabout trans tech executiveAJ Fernandez Rivera

GLOBAL

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SPECIALTY

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policies are underwritten by Aviva Insurance Company of Canada. Risk Management and

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...NOT LIKE THIS CEO“In the last 12 years, I only tried to take a week off

twice. The first time, the Orbital Sciencesrocket exploded and Richard Branson’s[Virgin Galactic] rocket exploded in that

same week. The second time, my rocketexploded. The lesson here is, don’t takea week off.” —Elon Musk in 2015

BE LIKE THIS CEO...“I give my assistant permission to changemy passcode to my social media andemail. I don’t know how to get in.”—Brian Scudamore of O2E Brands, whotakes off seven to eight weeks each year

64%

DON’T Expect staff to stay connected during their timeoff—and don’t contact them unless it’s life or death

DO

Consider giving employees—especially younger ones—anincentive to take time offA little inspiration: MNTN, a Texas-based ad agency(that just so happens to have Ryan Reynolds as chiefcreative officer), gives employees $2,000 a year tospend on vacation

DO Set parameterswell in advance for whenemployees can andcan’t take time off (likeyear-end or the peaksummer months) so theycan plan ahead

DON’T Offer unlimitedvacation without settinga minimum number ofdays off. Otherwise,workers will never take it

NEW RULES

Give mevacationor giveme deathWe live in a work-obsessedbut it’s time to get serious atime off. A Finnish study thin 1974 found men who stroa healthy lifestyle—by eatinexercising and not smokingfewer than three weeks of vwere 37% more likely to diedecades than their better-re

31 MILLIONumber of vacation days left unueach year, according to Expedia

DO

Set an exampleby taking timeoff yourself.Even bossesneed a break

MEN

WOMEN

GENDER IS A FACTOR IN WHETHER CANADIANS USETHEIR VACATION TIME

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Planned to take time off in 2021

58%


06/22

BY TREVOR COLE

THE EXCHANGE

Refined tasteAlex Pourbaix had always been a pipeline guy. But since taking overas CEO of Cenovus, profit is rising, debt is falling, and its $4.8-billionmerger with Husky has solved the producer’s downstream problem

Having come from the world of pipelines, Alex Pourbaix wasn’t fluent inthe lingo of the upstream when he became CEO of Cenovus, Canada’s third-largest oil and gas producer. “Flummoxed by all the acronyms” is how hemodestly puts it. He must be a fast learner. Upon leaving his job as COO ofTransCanada Corp. to join Cenovus in 2017, Pourbaix immediately beganbuilding on its strengths and eliminating its weaknesses. A merger withHusky Energy in early 2021 supercharged the company’s oil and gas pro-duction and delivered more than $1.2 billion in sustainable cost synergies.In the depths of the pandemic, with Cenovus bearing $14 billion in debt

from the merger and oil’s immediate prospects looking grim, Pourbaix locked in priceguarantees to protect the value of the company’s 50 million barrels in inventory. Now thedebt is falling, profits are surging, the hedges are gone and Cenovus seems poised to takeadvantage of a turbulent world’s new appetite for oil. We spoke to Pourbaix via Zoom.

So, rising prices, war in Ukraine,climate change, ESG investing, theadvance of electric vehicles—isthis a good time or a bad time to bein the oil and gas business?Well, in a world that is goingto need oil and gas for many,many decades to come, being anindustry that has an aspirationto drive our carbon emissions tonet zero, I actually think that is apretty good place to be. Canadais the holder of the third-largestreserves of oil on the planet.We have a commitment toopen, transparent regulation,rule of law, a focus on all of thethings that are important inESG, including our work withIndigenous people, clean air,clean water. And we’ve addedthis focus on decarbonizingthe upstream. I think we’rereasonably well positioned overthe coming decades.You recently decided to exit the oilhedges you initiated after buyingHusky. It’s going to cost you about$1.4 billion. What do you gain?

I look at the market right now,and demand looks very robust.Supply looks challenged,particularly coming out ofRussia, for obvious reasons.We could continue to see veryvolatile oil prices and not a lot ofsolutions to the factors drivinghigh prices. Our investors likethe exposure to the underlyingcommodity, and I think that’sreally the right decision.Was the idea to acquire Huskyalready in your mind when youjoined Cenovus?Cenovus was a great companywhen I joined it. Incredibleupstream resources. But welacked egress out of the province.We’re very exposed to highdifferentials (1) for Canadianheavy oil. I was worried aboutour cost competitiveness and ourbalance sheet. The real rationalefor putting the companiestogether was that it created amuch stronger, more resilientcompany. Under pretty much anyoil and gas price scenario, the

1. Differentialsrefers to thediscount appliedto heavy oilfrom Albertawhen sold in theU.S. (factoringin oil quality,marketabilityand logistics),compared to thebenchmark price.

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2. Pre-merger,Cenovus’s totaldownstreamthroughput(refining andupgrading) was185,900 barrels aday. Post-merger,it has risen to530,000 to580,000 b/d.

3. The other fivemembers areCanadian NaturalResources,Suncor,MEG Energy,Imperial Oil andConocoPhillipsCanada.

4. The feds usethe emissionstotal compiled forCanada’s NationalInventory Report(191 megatonnesfor the entire oiland gas sector),calling for an 81Mt reductionfrom 2019 levelsby 2030.

5. Pembina alsouses the CNIRemissions total,calling for thatfigure to be cutby 103 Mt by2030.

6. The recentbudget prescribesa sliding scale oftax credits forcarbon captureutilization andstorage projects.Most are eligiblefor 50% creditsuntil 2030, whenthe credits will becut by half.

combined balance sheet wouldimprove quicker. Our costs ofproduction were significantlyreduced. And by adding Husky’sdownstream refining assets, itsignificantly solved the egressconcern that was forcing us toaccept often significantly lowerCanadian prices for oil.Can you explain what you mean byegress?Whenever production exceedsthe takeaway capacity—viapipeline or use in refineriesor upgraders—you create ascenario where oil is trapped inthe province. As a result, it getsvery significant discounts to thevalue. In my first couple of yearsat Cenovus, there were timeswhere the differential was over$30 a barrel. That was the resultof this lack of pipeline capacity.How did the Husky merger solvethat problem?Husky owned and operateda number of refineries, bothin Canada and in the U.S. Theway the Enbridge pipelinesystem works, your ability tonominate production to puton the pipeline and take itdownstream is dependent onhaving a home for that oil—storage terminals, refineriesdownstream. So, it gave us theability to nominate volumes tomove on the Enbridge system.(2) On top of that, Husky hadsignificant pipeline contracts,including a large-scale, long-term contract on the original TCEnergy Keystone pipeline, whichallowed Husky to move oil all theway to the U.S. Gulf Coast. Thosewere all assets that becameavailable to us to move oil.The price of crude, which fellto single digits in 2020, is nowaround US$100 a barrel. Where doyou expect prices to go from here?None of us really knows whereoil prices are going. Even beforethe Ukraine issue with Russia,the industry had not beenspending enough money tobring on new volumes. And sowhat I would call the surplus oilsupply in the market has beeneroding for a number of years

as upstream companies haveunderinvested. Now, we’re kindof in this perfect storm. We’regetting the impact of a numberof years of underinvestment inthe upstream to maintain thatproduction and spare capacity.On top of that, you now haveone of the largest oil producersin the world, Russia, largelybeing prevented from gettingsome or all of its excess oil toglobal markets. And I don’t seeanything, short of a sharp, globalrecession, that is going to eat intothat oil demand. So, I suspectwe’re going to be in for a periodof quite volatile, trending towardhigher, oil prices.Is US$200-a-barrel oil possible?If oil were to go over US$150,I think you would start seeingsignificant demand destruction,which would prevent oil fromheading up toward US$200.You mentioned the lack ofinvestment in new production.Some of that, I think, comes fromESG investors steering moneyelsewhere. What’s your attitudetoward the ESG movement?There is no doubt that has beena bit of an issue. Some of it hasbeen based on a view that reallyunderestimates the challengesof moving to a completelyemissions-free environment.Cenovus is now part of the OilSands Pathways to Net Zeroalliance, which is a mouthful.You’re correct, it is a mouthful.We just call it Pathways.What’s the purpose of thatalliance? Is it chiefly to win overthese ESG investors?I think I’d describe it adifferent way. There are sixmembers, including Cenovus.(3) Collectively we represent

about 95% of oil sandsproduction and about 10%of Canada’s greenhouse gasemissions. We came to theconclusion that moving towardnet zero in the oil sands is anincredibly challenging goal.Rather than doing this on ourown, let’s collaborate, sharetechnologies, collectively fundthe infrastructure required. Wethought combining all our effortswould improve our chances ofgetting to net zero, and allow usto do it cheaper and quicker thanwe otherwise would have.How involved are you in thealliance?I’m extraordinarily involved.For the better part of a year anda half, we—the six CEOs—havebeen meeting every Fridayat 7 a.m. We have engaged ahuge, multidisciplinary teamof employees. We’re hiring.There is a huge amount of workgoing on, on what we call ourfoundational project, to captureCO2 at our oil sands facilitiesand move it by a large-scalepipeline to depleted oil and gasreservoirs in the Cold Lake area,where we have the capabilityto store decades of emissionsfrom the oil sands. Right nowwe’re doing the engineeringand environmental work onthat. We’re planning for theregulatory application, and thisis all with a view to having thatin service by about 2030.In the recent budget, the federalgovernment set an emissionsreduction target for oil and gascompanies of 42% of emissions by2030. Pathways pegs the currentCO2 emissions for its oil sandsoperations at 68 megatonnes. Andit has set a goal of reducing thoseemissions by 22 Mt by 2030. That’sa 32% reduction. Why aren’t youaiming for that higher number? (4)We based our Pathways targetson what we believe the industrycan realistically do. One thinga lot of people don’t appreciateis there is no “low-carbon”and “high-carbon” setting in aprocessing plant or productionfacility. Pretty much everything

100%

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MAY 1, 2019

CANADIAN NATURAL RESOURCES

CENOVUS ENERGYIMPERIAL OILSUNCOR ENERGY

MAY 1, 2022

CENOVUS VS. BIG ENERGYPAST THREE YEARS


7. Operating costsfor ChristinaLake and FosterCreek (two-thirdsof Cenovus’s oilsands production)are below $10a barrel of oilequivalent (BOE),with operatingcosts forecastto be $10.50 to$12. Forecastedcosts for itsNewfoundlandprojects are $40to $45 in 2022.

8. Steam-assistedgravity drainageinvolves injectingsteam into thebitumen to allowit to flow, whichrequires burningfossil fuels.The alternativesolvents methodinjects a lighthydrocarbon intothe bitumen toloosen it.

9. CEOcompensationat seven majorCanadian energyfirms jumpedmore than 21%in 2021, for anaverage of $13.4million. Pourbaix’scompensationrose 47% to $14million, including$9.6 million inshare and optionawards, anda $2.9-millionbonus.

10. In lateApril, Cenovusannounced itwould tripleits base annualdividend from$0.14 per share to$0.42.

11. Cenovusforecasts 42,000to 48,000 BOEa day from itsChina projectand up to 13,000BOE a day fromIndonesia.

12. At fullproduction, theWest White Roseproject wouldproduce 50,000barrels a day.

we’re going to do to reduceour emissions involves verylarge-scale capital projects.Some of these are multibillion-dollar construction projects. Iwould argue that the emissionsreduction proposed by Pathwaysis a very, very aggressive target.The Pembina Institute, a clean-energy think tank, says emissionsfrom Canada’s oil and gas industryneed to be reduced by 54% by2030. (5)I can only speak for the oil sands,but I would be amazed if theindustry could meet that targetwithout shutting in significantproduction. This industryprobably represents 8% to 10%of Canadian GDP. It is a massivecontributor to the economy. Ithink people need to be verythoughtful about what can bedone and what the impact wouldbe on the Canadian economy oftaking some of those positions.You’ve launched three new carbon-capture projects that will roll outover the next five years, costingas much as $3 billion. Do thoseprojects depend on federal CCUStax credits? (6)It’s really important toremember that almost all ofthese investments are purelyadded costs for the industry.They tend not to come with arevenue element. So it’s reallyimportant that we’re focusedon competitiveness and thatwe’re not taking steps that otheroil-producing countries arenot taking. I mean, we’re gonnacontribute tens of billions ofdollars as an industry. Thatinvestment tax credit is veryimportant to help the industrymake these investments.Your Bay du Nord offshore projectwill produce carbon emissions ofeight kilograms a barrel, comparedto oil sands emissions that arealmost nine times higher. What’sthe future of the oil sands ifoffshore oil is so much cleaner?These offshore projectsare incredibly low in termsof emissions, but they areextraordinarily expensive.You’re building exploration

and production platforms invery deep water, in incrediblychallenging weather conditions.In the oil sands, we have 170billion barrels of producible oilthat sit either dozens or severalhundred metres under thesurface. We have no explorationrisk. At Cenovus, our sustainingcapital—the amount you needto spend every year to keep yourproduction flat—is between$4 and $6 a barrel. And ouroperating costs are now below$10 a barrel. Compare that tothe significant costs and risksin these deep offshore projects,and it’s really easy to understandwhy the oil sands remain such animportant resource. (7)Does everything then hinge oncarbon capture?Carbon capture is reallyimportant in the initial phases,like the first 10 years or so ofthis decarbonization quest we’reon. As we get past 2030, othertechnologies will start to bemore meaningful—things likereplacing steam in SAGD, in-situprojects with solvents. (8) Asyou get into 2040, small modularnuclear reactors in the oil sandswould be another obvious way tohugely reduce emissions. I thinkwe’ll see increasingly innovativetechnologies as we head to 2050.On a different topic, compensationfor oil patch execs has gottensome attention recently. Everyone,including you, got big raises thisyear. (9) What’s your take on howoil executives are paid?For the five years I’ve been inthis industry, there has been ahuge difference between thecompensation opportunity,which is I think what you’rereferring to, versus actual

compensation. I look at mycompensation—about 90%of it is not guaranteed. Ihave to deliver very specificperformance and share priceoutcomes. Long before I get paid,our shareholders get paid.Although, among the majorCanadian oil and gas producers,Cenovus pays the lowest dividendby far. Why do you return so littlemoney to shareholders? (10)When oil went down to US$10 abarrel, with the balance sheet asstrained as it was, Cenovus reallyhad no choice but to reduce itsdividend. Just a few months ago,we doubled it. As we continueto pay down our debt, ourplan is to continue to improveand increase shareholderreturns. We’ve also announceda significant share buy-backprogram that we continue toexecute on.You have projects underwayin China, Indonesia, andNewfoundland and Labrador.Which has the most potential?The Asian projects are all highlyattractive projects because gasprices are very high in Asia.But they’re of relatively modestscale. (11) We produce about800,000 barrels of oil a day, soscale is important. On the eastcoast of Canada, we have a veryimportant decision ahead of us,and that is whether to proceedwith the West White Roseproject. We’re probably a fewmonths away. (12)The Friday mornings with yourPathways partners—what’s themood of those meetings?It has been a real eye-openerto see how we’ve been able tocollaborate. My peers are lookingat this as sort of the moonshotchallenge of our age, for thisindustry. I would say there’s agreat energy in the meetings.I actually really enjoy them.This interview has been editedand condensed.

Trevor Cole is the author of fivebooks, including the novelPractical Jean, which won theStephen Leacock Medal for Humour.


06/22

etween the mid-1990s, when my wife and I bought an affordable semiin a gentrifying working-class part of Toronto, and today’s delusionalhousing market, I estimate the home’s resale value has grown by about$1 million. If we decided to sell, we’d qualify for the capital gains taxexemption for a principal residence because the house is where welive. That means we’d pay no income tax on its increase in value.

By contrast, if we’d chosen to keep renting for all those years andinvest the difference in the stock market, not only would our totalreturn likely be lower, but we’d also have to pay taxes on our invest-ment income—at 50% our marginal rate for realized capital gains.(Even if we had invested inside the shelter of an RRSP, we’d have ben-efitted from annual tax deductions when we made our contributions,but we’d be taxed in full on both the original contributions and allthe investment earnings when we draw those funds in retirement.) Inother words, homeowner me gets to ensure that $1 million in equityaccumulation remains beyond the reach of the taxman, whereasrenter/investor me has no such privilege.

This so-called “home ownership bias” in tax codes has been awell-recognized phenomenon for decades. “There have been numer-ous studies that show that if you include tax benefits, 95% of fund-ing at all levels of government—federal, provincial, municipal—goto homeowners, not renters,” says Carolyn Whitzman, a retired pro-fessor of urban planning and expert adviser to the Housing Assess-ment Resource Tools project at the University of British Columbia.Moreover, these benefits tend to be encased in politically bomb-proofarmour. “Definitely a third-rail issue,” Whitzman says, recalling a

raucous debate about reducingAustralia’s version of the capitalgains exemption that played outwhile she taught at the Univer-sity of Melbourne.

But as house and condo pricesin Canada rise inexorably, at apace well beyond increases inaverage household income, itseems reasonable to predict thatan ever-larger proportion of thecountry’s population is lookingahead to a lifetime of renting. So,one can ask, why do homeown-ers get to put their fingers on thescale, even when there’s plentyof evidence these benefits arehelping to widen the wealth gapbetween those who own prop-erty and those who don’t?

In Canada, the principal resi-dence exemption (PRE) datesback to a 1972 tax reform law thatrepresented the culmination ofa decade of debate about how tomake the national revenue sys-tem more equitable for lower-income households. Alongsidethe PRE, the law provided mea-sures such as deductions forchildcare expenses, as well asnew taxes on capital gains asso-ciated with other investmentclasses. Such was the temper ofthe times.

Even today, Ottawa’s statedreason for providing the PRE isthat it creates a “social benefit.”“This measure,” a summary ofthe 1971 bill stated, “recognizesthat principal homes are gener-ally purchased to provide basicshelter and not as an invest-ment, and increases flexibilityin the housing market by facili-tating the movement of familiesfrom one principal residenceto another in response to theirchanging circumstances.” Giventhe speculative madness of thereal estate market circa 2022, thelanguage is almost shockinglyanachronistic.

Homes today are absolutely anasset class. They provide finan-cial security for retirees, incomestreams for Airbnb hosts or, indi-rectly, tax-free investment vehi-cles in the guise of real estateinvestment trust units. Contrac-

BIG IDEA

Home advantageCapital gains on principal residences are beyond the taxman’s reach.Is that fair to renters?

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headed in the direction of Euro-pean countries where large seg-ments of the population livein long-term rentals—after all,while house prices may riseless quickly with higher interestrates, they will never actually godown—why is the tax system notneutral when it comes to one’sform of housing?

“I’m pretty favourable to theidea that the tax system shouldbe neutral to the tenure of hous-ing,” says Kevin Milligan, a pro-fessor of economics at UBC’sVancouver School of Economics.“My instinct as an economistis that we ought to have peoplemaking their own choices abouthow they live, how they workand how they save, rather thanhaving the tax code push themone way or the other.”

To that end, Canadian policymakers could begin thinkingabout some form of rebalanc-ing—such as allowing rentersto put more money into tax-freesavings accounts as a way ofclosing the equity-accumulationgap between those who ownhomes and those who don’t.“Maybe there’s an argument forthat,” Milligan says. “That couldmake some sense for providingan equal opportunity for tax ben-efits to renters.” Of course, sucha solution wouldn’t help govern-ments fill public coffers in theface of diminishing tax revenues.

As the ranks of renters increasesteadily, and the wealth chasmbetween owners and tenantsgrows ever wider, the politics ofthe principal residence exemp-tion might someday soon getflipped, too. /John Lorinc

06/22

Big Idea is produced with the support of our advisory panel

$7.8 BILLIONOn June 29, 1997—25 years ago—the first iPhone wasreleased in the U.S., starting at US$499 for the 4GB model.Apple sold 6.1 million devices in the first year

Wanda M. Costen, Dean,Smith School of BusinessNancy Evans, Executive Director,Marketing and Communications,Smith School of Business

Yrjo Koskinen, Associate Dean, Research,Haskayne School of BusinessStephane Massinon, Director, PublicRelations, Haskayne School of Business

Oanh Kasperski, Director, Marketingand Community EngagementGillian Mulvale, Associate Dean,Graduate Studies and Research

tors, realtors and speculators buy, renovate and flip houses to drive uptheir resale value, while developers market condos to investors.

And while owners of investment properties don’t qualify for thePRE—they must pay tax on any capital gains when they sell or oth-erwise dispose of the property—that hasn’t kept them from trying touse the exemption to avoid a tax hit. Indeed, the matter of determiningwhether a tax filer can claim the PRE has become a cottage industryfor accountants, even as the Canada Revenue Agency and federal taxcourts move to clamp down on people trying to pull a fast one.

In this spring’s federal budget the government went further, sayingit will be introducing new rules to ensure that profits from flippingproperties will be taxed “fully and fairly.” The Liberals also announcedthey’ll be wading into the sloppy national conversation about thefinancialization of housing with “a review of housing as an asset class,in order to better understand the role of large corporate players in themarket and the impact on Canadian renters and homeowners.” How-ever, there’s no mention of rethinking the PRE.

That’s not only because it would be political suicide—one onlinepoll done before last fall’s federal election found more than two-thirdsof respondents were opposed to taxing principal-residence capitalgains—but also because there’s a view among some economists thatdoing away with the PRE wouldn’t accomplish much anyway. “Theargument for taxing capital gains on the sale of owner-occupied prin-cipal residences is twofold,” wrote the C.D. Howe Institute’s JeremyKronick and Alexandre Laurin in a 2021 policy brief. “First, the argu-ment goes, the tax will decrease demand, putting a stopper on illogicalprice appreciations. Second, governments are starved for tax revenue,and taxing these gains would help fill that gap. In practice, however,neither of these is likely to play out as expected.”

In fact, since the Liberals took office in 2015, the estimated foregonerevenue due to the PRE through this year tops $55 billion, accordingto Department of Finance statistics. By contrast, the budget for the10-year National Housing Strategy, their much-hyped plan to improveaffordability, is $72 billion.

And what about the argument of fairness? If Canadian society is

Projected foregone tax revenue due to the 2022 principal residence exemption

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1 Let the workspeak for itself

Tesfaye had been releasing music anonymously onlinefor a couple of years befor h d d Hof Balloons in 2011. Even wfrom Drake, he decided toIt worked. Countless R&Bthe internet for anything tabout him, drawing themmusic. By year’s end, Theof the most hyped artists

Stay true toyourself andyour fansBy building hisbrand beforerevealing histrue identity, TheWeeknd held on

creative controlf his work—for it. Whenic Records inhis vision mightThis does notnk it means,” hen his blog. “Youwhat you fell inA decade later,s on to control,s his 2016p with Pumaoming HBO

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BUSINESS

re he dropped Housewith an early co-sign

keep up the ruse.fans scoured

they could learneven closer to hisWeeknd was onein the world.

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and fans loved him fhe signed to Republ2012, they worriedbe compromised. “Tmean what you thin

assured them onwill still get wlove with.” Ahe still holdswhether it’spartnershipor his upcoseries Theis the co-cEuphoria’sexecutive p

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STAND UP FORYOUR VALUESTesfaye’s Blinding Lightsdethroned Chubby Checker’sThe Twist last year to topBillboard’s Greatest Songs of AllTime chart. Yet he got zero Grammynominations for it. Black artistshad long been disproportionatelyignored, but missing the biggestsong of 2020 was even moreblatant. Tesfaye blamed the RecordingAcademy’s anonymous nominationcommittees. The Grammys did awaywith them within weeks—but he’s stillboycotting the awards.

Playing sold-out concerts worldwide,Tesfaye met plenty of Torontonianswho’d left the city because of acreative void. So, he and his creativedirector, La Mar Taylor, teamed upwith Scarborough entrepreneurAhmed Ismail to create HXOUSE,a multidisciplinary incubator onToronto’s waterfront for artists infashion, music and visual media.The Weeknd’s rise has beencalled improbable; he’smaking sure the next genhas better odds.

EmbraceunexpectedconnectionsThe 2019 film UncutGems saw Adam Sandleron an anxiety-riddledride through New York’sdiamond district. In it, TheWeeknd plays himself as arising star circa 2012. Therole proved astonishinglylucrative: Tesfayebefriended the film’sscorer, Oneohtrix PointNever, a relationship thatculminated in the 2022album Dawn FM, which

might be Tesfaye’s bestyet. And it wouldn’thave happened ifhe’d just taken his

Uncut Gems chequeand walked.

Spreadthewealth

If hot-desking is akin toshowing up at a hip restaurantin hopes of scoring a table,then hotelling is simplymaking a reservation first.“Both are a big step away fromeveryone having a dedicatedspace,” says work futuristRavin Jesuthasan, co-authorof Work Without Jobs: How toReboot Your Organization’sWork Operating System. “Thepandemic has completelychanged the way we workin an office,” so ditch theassumption that of courseeveryone aspires to their ownspace. “The new workplaceis for the collaboration,engagement and innovationyou can’t get at home,” hesays. Relocate any overheadsavings to building a spaceworkers want to use, with amix of larger meeting roomsand comfy nooks. Jesuthasancautions against mandatingminimum in-office hours,though; instead, “you wantto create a pull as opposed toa push.” Then invest in coolbooking software, becauseunlike first-come-first-servedhot-desk options, hotellingdone right lets staff knowexactly who they’ll see onany given day and scheduleaccordingly. /Rosemary Counter

ASK AN EXPERT

How do I get mystaff on board withpost-pandemichotelling?

Number of emojis approved by the Unicode Consortiumas of 2021. Have a unique idea for a new one?Unicode is accepting applications until the end of July3,633

There was a moment a decade ago when the musician known as The Weeknd was botheverywhere and nowhere. The Torontonian’s career popped off with a free mixtape ofslinky, hedonistic R&B that seized the attention of fans and critics—all without playinga single concert or revealing who he was. He gradually shed his enigmatic persona, andthe Ethiopian-Canadian Abel Tesfaye settled into the role of bona fide pop star. Yet he’smanaged to keep control of his ever-expanding projects. /Josh O’Kane

WHAT YOU CAN LEARN FROM...

The Weeknd

2

eff Olsen, owner of BrookdaleTreeland Nurseries,comes by his love of growing honestly: He grew up

in the family garden plant business, studied horticulture atuniversity and began working for the company in 1992.

It wasn’t until after he took over the family business 13years ago that Mr. Olsen discovered his greatest strengthwould be helping the bottom line flourish.

Today, Schomberg, Ont.-based Brookdale is one ofCanada’s largest growers of garden plants, with more than$50-million in annual revenues, and is a supplier of majorhome and garden retailers such as Home Depot, Loblaws,Costco and CanadianTire.

It means less time working in the soil, but Mr. Olsen, thecompany’s president and chief executive officer, doesn’t mind.

“I thought I would be working with plants my whole life andI still do as much as I can, but most of my time these days isspent on business development, numbers, accountants, andlawyers,” he says with a laugh.

The company’s modest roots began with the 1911 foundingof Brookdale Kingsway Nurseries, which merged in 1983 withTreelandWholesale Nursery, a landscape contractor supplybusiness founded in 1977 by Mr. Olsen’s father, Paul.

The merged business grew rapidly until the recession inthe mid-1990s curtailed demand from the landscape sector.Fortunately, the Olsens saw salvation in the Canadian arrival ofbig-box retailers.

Brookdale TreelandNurseries flourishesamid Canadians’renewed discoveryof gardening

“Mass merchant retail came into the Canadianmarketplace, starting with home improvement stores andthen moving over to grocery stores,” Mr. Olsen says. “Itseemed like every large retail chain was adding a gardencentre to its stores, so we shifted focus from landscapesupply to retail supply.”

Mr. Olsen also took a different approach to running thebusiness when he bought it from his father and his twopartners in 2009, deciding the most important investmentwould be in management.

“We took the approach years ago that we were going tohave a professional management team run the business,which is different than so many people in our space wherethey’re really small family businesses,” he says.

Under the direction of Mr. Olsen, the company madeseveral acquisitions and now has multiple nurseries in Ontarioand British Columbia. It also developed a Christmas marketand live holiday décor, outdoor décor and greenery hasbecome a booming second season.

Then COVID-19 arrived, just ahead of the pivotal springseason.

“We only have four to six weeks where we do all ofour spring business and in March 2020, we were fillingour greenhouses, getting ready for the season,” he says.“Everything came to a stop immediately.”

Most of its retail customers were closed and the company,which employs about 160 full-time employees and more than600 people during peak season, laid off staff.

Mr. Olsen, as part of the executive board and COVID-19 taskforce of Landscape Ontario HorticulturalTrades Association,lobbied hard – and ultimately successfully – for outdoor gardenretail to re-open.

“All of a sudden, gardening became the most popularhobby. Demand was very strong,” he says. “We broughtmillions of young Canadians to our industry for the first time in2020 and they came back in 2021.We expect that they will becustomers for life as gardening begins as a hobby, becomes apassion that turns into an obsession.”

An online sales platform, which up to that point had notbeen a big part of the business, became essential withBrookdale responsible for online fulfilment for both HomeDepot andWalmart in Canada, Costco in Canada and the U.S.and Lowes in the U.S.

Revenues hit $53-million in 2021, up 70 per cent from fiveyears earlier. Centralized management with daily reportingon key metrics such as labour and transport were key tomanaging the surge, says Mr. Olsen.

“The work that we had done for five-to-six years prior inbuilding a professional group really came to fruition becausewe had the infrastructure, we had the team, and we were ableto flourish through it,” Mr. Olsen says.

SPONSOR CONTENTAdvertising produced by The Globe Content Studio. The Globe’s editorial department was not involved in its creation.

Brookdale isCanada’s largestgrower of gardenplants and a supplierof major home andgarden retailers.

J

BTN.CA

Making Life Beautiful

Proud to be recognized as one ofCanada’s Best Managed Companies of 2022


he COVID-19 pandemic has been awful in almostevery conceivable way—more than 6.2 milliondead, countless businesses destroyed, governmentfinances in shambles, and the mental health of ageneration of kids scarred in ways we may not fullyunderstand for years. Awful in almost every con-ceivable way—except, that is, for investors.

In the early weeks of the crisis, as lockdownstook effect and comparisons to the Great Depres-sion abounded, central banks, including the Bank ofCanada, slashed interest rates to zero and launchedquantitative easing measures that saw central-bankbalance sheets nearly double to US$27 trillion. Theeffect of all that monetary stimulus on asset prices,like real estate and stocks, was immediate.

From the middle of March 2020, when the shock ofthe unknown gripped the world—exactly how doesa global economy turn off, then reboot itself?—mar-kets began to explode; save for a few pauses alongthe way, they haven’t looked back. And the Toronto

Stock Exchange, with its heavy weighting in natu-ral resources, has been a relative outperformer overthe past year, especially as the Russia-Ukraine warkicked commodity prices into overdrive.

Still, it’s hard to appreciate how superchargedmarkets have been until you compare this post-recession cycle against past downturns and recov-eries. Over the past 50 years, only in the case of thedouble-dip recession in the 1980s was the marketback in the black at this stage of the recovery, andthat rebound was much more subdued than whatwe’ve seen since 2020. (We also included the marketperformance after the 1929 crash for perspective.)

Will it last? At press time in early May, investorswere clearly being shaken by the rapid pace at whichcentral banks appeared to be planning to withdrawstimulus from the economy, leading some econo-mists to warn of another recession. If that happens,the most confounding market recovery in decadescould become a distant memory. /Jason Kirby S

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Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon, a.k.a. D-Sol, will DJ at Chicago’sLollapalooza music fest in July. His 2021 Goldman compensationwas US$35 million. His DJing fee will go to charity

COVID-19 crash versus other TSX routs

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28

30%

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COVID-19 RECESSION(FROM JANUARY 2020)

DOUBLE-DIP RECESSION(FROM JUNE 1981)

BLACK MONDAY(FROM SEPTEMBER 1987)

GREAT RECESSION(FROM AUGUST 2008)

1970s OIL CRISIS(FROM OCTOBER 1973)

DOT-COM CRASH(FROM AUGUST 2000)

GREAT DEPRESSION(FROM SEPTEMBER 1929)

MONTHS AFTER PRE-CRASH PEAK

DECODER

YOU CALL THAT A CRASH?

ver its 65-year history, Hatch has become a Canadian-made global success story by empowering its people

while staying true to its mission to produce positive change.The private, employee-owned company offers engineering

consulting and project implementation services forthe mining, energy and infrastructure sectors.Today,Mississauga, Ont.-based Hatch employs more than 9,000professionals in 150 countries, including roughly 4,000 inCanada.

“Most of the projects we deliver are necessary to bringpositive change to the world,” says Randy McMeekin,Hatch’s global managing director of engineering.

For example, Hatch’s mining practice is heavily focusedon lithium projects that can increase battery supply andultimately power the green energy revolution.

“We’re involved in the majority of the lithium projects inthe world,” Mr. McMeekin says. “We’re very proud of that.”

Its energy practice focuses on green energy productionand storage, such as pumped-storage hydroelectricitysolutions, as well as innovations in nuclear power, like smallmodular reactors (SMRs) that provide an affordable, safe,renewable energy source.

How Hatch is helpingdrive positive change

“We’re on the forefront of SMR design andimplementation,” Mr. McMeekin says.

Hatch similarly champions sustainable transportationsolutions through its work in urban solutions andinfrastructure, including most of the Metrolinx projects in theGreaterToronto Area and 80 other major tunnelling projectsaround the world.

In recent years, the company has expanded its work fromproject development to ongoing management and businesssupport.

“Hatch has the unique ability to provide leading-edgedigital project delivery solutions, as well as novel digitalapplications for operations.This allows our clients toengineer and construct their asset as cost-effectivelyas possible, and then operate it for decades withunprecedented efficiency,” Mr. McMeekin says. “AtHatch we consider ourselves ‘life cyclists.’We go beyondengineering and bring unique operation and advisory skills tohelp our client’s entire business.That’s one of the things thatmakes us special.”

He says the company owes much of its success to thetalent it employs, as well as its management structure andinternal culture. As a mission-oriented company, Hatch hiresskilled professionals who believe in its values and empowersthem to put those skills to use in ways that make a lastingdifference.

“We don’t have a complicated organization chart; it’s avery flat hierarchy.We form teams globally, bringing the rightexpertise that our clients need,” Mr. McMeekin explains.“There’s no rigid chain of command; people are empoweredand enabled to bring their best thinking to really hardproblems. Every voice is heard.”

The company – which operates in traditionally male-dominated sectors like engineering, mining, constructionand professional services – is also committed to improvingdiversity and inclusion within its ranks and the industry morebroadly.

“We have achieved great success in attracting a widediversity of gender and race, and we believe it’s incrediblyimportant to bring plurality of thought to our client’schallenges. We create an environment where diversity andinclusion are embraced,” Mr. McMeekin says. “We’ve madegreat strides and we’re committed to continuously improvingin this space.”

Hatch remains heavily involved in tackling some of theworld’s greatest challenges, and Mr. McMeekin says thecompany will continue to do so.

“The world is facing big challenges, with climate changeperhaps being the biggest. Hatch is directly involved insolving these challenges, on the front lines,” he says. “Ourvision is the pursuit of a better world through positive change– and we are all committed to that.”


Hatch’s exceptional,diverse teamscombine vastengineering andbusiness knowledge,applying them to theworld’s toughestchallenges.

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WESTSHORE TERMINALSINVESTMENT CORP.VANCOUVER

REVENUE (2021) $340.5 MILLION

PROFIT (2021) $107.8 MILLION

THREE-YEAR SHARE PRICE GAIN 67%

P/E RATIO (TRAILING) 20.4

Coal has been powering economies formore than 300 years, both as fuel andas a key input in steelmaking. Despiteprotests from environmentalists, itwon’t be phased out soon. To ship itoverseas from Canada’s largest coalmines in the West, there are just threeterminals to choose from: RidleyTerminals, Neptune Bulk Terminals,and the larger and lone publicly

traded alternative, WestshoreTerminals Investment Corp.,south of Vancouver.

Westshore is one ofthose glamour-challengedcompanies that keepsdelivering profits year afteryear, amid cyclical resourcemarkets, a pandemic andoccasional criticism fromclimate activists. Oneshareholder who takes it allin stride is also Westshore’slargest: 93-year-old billionaireJim Pattison, whose companiesheld 37.9% of Westshore as of

March and have owned a large stakesince the early 1990s. “It’s obviouslya unique asset,” says Nick Desmarais,Westshore’s secretary and vice-president of corporate development,and managing director of legal servicesfor Jim Pattison Group. “They don’tbuild new ports anymore.”

Total coal shipments have beenrelatively constant for a decade at 25

million to 30 million tonnes a year.But the mix of steelmaking coal andthermal coal burned for heat andpower varies widely, from about one-quarter thermal in 2016 to just over halfin 2021. The customer mix and needschange, too, and there are seasonal upsand downs. “We’re always adjusting,”says Desmarais.

Westshore’s customers are large coalmines in Canada, and it ships theiroutput to buyers overseas. Desmaraissays that, historically, the companyhas maintained a basic profit marginof 40% to 45%, which allows forreinvestment.

Japan, South Korea and China are thelargest buyers, and more than 80% ofthe thermal coal goes to governmentutilities in Japan, South Korea andChile. Desmarais says Westshoreunderstands thermal coal willeventually be replaced, but it’ll take awhile. “These countries don’t have theluxury of wind and solar,” Desmaraissays—or at least not enough of it yet.

And Westshore is diversifying. Itcompleted $240 million in upgradesfrom 2014 to 2019. Last July, it reachedan agreement with global mining giantBHP Group to provide port servicesuntil 2051 for millions of tonnesof annual potash exports from the$7.5-billion first phase of BHP’s giantJansen mine in Saskatchewan. PattisonGroup has been a committed long-terminvestor in Westshore, and it still looksvery satisfied. /John Daly

FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION

1. On March 9, the Bidenadministration issued anexecutive order directingvarious U.S. federaldepartments to report onthe risks and benefits ofcrypto, and how to regulateit. Mosoff says that’sencouraging. “The assetclass is no longer this tinykindergarten toy, and it’stime to figure out whatnational strategies aregoing to be.”

2. The big constitutionalhurdle in Canada: Thesecurities industry isprovincially regulated.Ontario’s Capital MarketsModernization Taskforce,for one, included manyrecommendations oncrytpo in its January 2021report. But Mosoff says anational strategy is a longway off: “You’re not justdealing with one beasthere. You’re dealing with anumber of them.”

3. In March, 11 leadingCanadian companies—including Wealthsimple,Ether Capital, DapperLabs and Bitbuy ownerWonderFi—formed theCanadian Web3 Council tohelp position the countryas a leader in crypto,blockchain and relatedtech. “All the conversationswe’ve had with regulatorshave been very siloed,”Mosoff says. “The tradeassociation will try tostreamline them.”

4. Even withoutcomprehensiveregulations, Canada hasnotched some impressivefirsts. The biggest so far:the world’s first Bitcoinexchange-traded fund,from Toronto’s PurposeInvestments, which theOSC approved in early2021. “They still don’t havetrue spot-trade ETFs in theU.S.,” says Mosoff.

5. Regulators may needentirely new structuresfor crypto. “Thingslike access to DeFi[decentralized financialarrangements not involvingintermediaries], staking[allowing a blockchain toput your crypto to workand paying a yield], accessto stablecoins [designedto have a relatively stableprice]—that stuff hasbeen held back becauseplatforms are afraid ofbeing offside,” says Mosoff.

FOMO INVESTING

5 things we learned from Brian MosoffCryptocurrency is an estimated US$3-trillion asset class, and U.S. and Canadian regulators have stepped up efforts to developcomprehensive rules for it. Mosoff is CEO of Toronto-based Ether Capital, which went public in 2018. Whatever crypto’sremaining outsider-nerd-disrupter appeal, Mosoff says companies crave regulatory certainty: “It’s been too many yearsof too many businesses sitting in a grey area, wanting to be good actors but not knowing how to comply.” /JD

06/22

$35

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APRIL 28, 2022

WESTSHORE TERMINALS INVESTMENT CORP.PAST FIVE YEARS

n the century since London, Ont.-based Trudell MedicalLtd. was founded, the health care devices company

has grown into a global conglomerate with six operatingcompanies and more than 400 patents, doing business in110-plus countries. Over the years the company has investedheavily in product and process research and development andhas improved the quality of patients’ lives around the world.

Trudell remains a family business at its heart, and that is thekey to its success, says George Baran, executive chair, whosegreat grandfather on his mother’s side started the companyin 1922 to supply religious artifacts and medical supplies tothe Sisters of St. Joseph, which ran St. Joseph’s Hospital inLondon, Ont.

How Trudell Medicalretains its family valuesas a global conglomerate “My father, Mitchell Baran, purchased it from my mother’s

side of the family, so it’s actually been in two families; butthey’re both my ancestors so you can say it’s the same familyfor 100 years,” Mr. Baran says. “While we’ve modernizedthe company in many ways, we have maintained the familyvalues.”

For example, when the company decided to replace itsplant in Plattsburgh, N.Y., with a modernized facility, it had theopportunity to relocate. It made sense to consider a locationcloser to customers and better situated for transport. ButTrudell chose to rebuild in Plattsburgh, in large part becausethat’s where its employees had built their lives.

“We owe a lot of credit to our employees who have workedvery hard to make us as successful as we have been,” he says.“We chose to reinvest in Plattsburgh because of our loyalty tothe people who work there.”

Mr. Baran creditsTrudell’s management team with makingthe company a sector leader by driving innovation and creatinga culture where every employee feels motivated to contribute.

Trudell Medical Limited is the holding company that servesas a corporate resource for its various subsidiaries, but eachone operates independently with oversight from the parentcompany.

Mr. Baran says the health care business is changing andinformation and data are the future. It’s whyTrudell recentlyinvested in its digital strategy by acquiring Aetonix SystemsInc., an Ottawa-based virtual care company that allows thepatient, family, caregivers, and the clinical care team toshare data and communicate in real time.Trudell also hasinvestments in digital medical device companies in Polandand Australia.Trudell has investments in several startupcompanies in e-health and medical device technology throughits BarvestVentures Inc. affiliate.

“Trudell views technology as a vehicle to improve patientcare, the patient’s experience, and their connection to theircare team,” Mr. Baran says. “Technology can provide thecare team with improved access to necessary informationand can improve visibility and accountability for patient careand treatment decisions. Despite technological change andeconomic pressures on the healthcare systems, we mustremain focused on the patient to be successful.”

He adds the company is continuously innovating to stayahead in the increasingly competitive health care industry.

“Although we’ve been around a long time, and we’re agood-sized company and leader in our market segment, wehave a degree of humility,” Mr. Baran says. “We realize wecan’t rest on our laurels.We’ve got to continually reinventourselves and keep up with environmental changes and notbecome arrogant or complacent.”


George Baran,executive chair,outside theheadquarters of thecentury-old companyin London, Ont.

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intermittent. We like Tourmaline Oil. It’san ESG-friendly Canadian producer. Itbegins exports to a U.S. liquified naturalgas terminal next year and should supplyanother terminal in Kitimat, B.C., once it’scompleted. Its management team is alsofocused on returning cash to shareholdersthrough regular and special dividends.What about oil?Oil’s growth will abate, but ESG-friendlyoil will still be instrumental in the energytransition. I see a solid decade, or twobusiness cycles, for oil companies, but themarket is valuing them for less time thanthat. I own oil stocks because of the attrac-tive valuation. We like Canadian NaturalResources. It has disciplined management

that’s highly focused on reducing emissions.West Fraser Timber and Interfor are among yourholdings. Why do you like these forestry stocks whenrising interest rates can hurt the housing market?Rising rates are a headwind, but this is a longer-term play with tailwinds. There is still a housingshortage in just about every North American mar-ket. And lumber is a construction material that isenvironmentally friendly. Wood can sequester car-bon and become a substitute for CO2-rich cement.You also run the Mackenzie Precious Metals Fund.What’s your outlook for gold given a growing interestin bitcoin as “digital gold”?I have been selling gold equities and gold bullionas one way to insure portfolios against the loss ofpurchasing power—particularly those with a lotof fixed-income investments. I don’t want to claimthat bitcoin may not be insurance, but it hasn’t beentested yet. Given the regulatory risk with bitcoinand price behaviour that’s highly correlated withspeculative assets, I don’t think that’s a good use foryour money. /Shirley Won

Resource funds aren’t seen as ESG-friendly. What’sbehind your strategy?That thinking was always present, but we now takea quantitative approach. We have a dedicated ESGanalyst and do sustainability benchmarking. Forenvironmental performance, we want to see prog-ress and comparison with peers. To summarize, Iwant the improvers. People may buy shares of elec-tric-vehicle maker Tesla to deal with climate change,but I say you have a far bigger impact buying sharesof commodity companies to incentivize them to becleaner. We own Alcoa, an aluminum producer thatdraws power from renewable energy, versus Alumi-num Corp. of China, which uses coal. There isn’t adifference in commodity prices between good andbad actors yet, but the Russia-Ukraine war is bring-ing that awareness to the forefront. In the future, theESG-friendly resource companies should benefit.That’s the opportunity.China’s growth fuelled the commodity supercycle ofthe 2000s decade. Given the recent resource-stockrally, are we in a new one?I think we’re at the beginning of a new supercyclewith tailwinds from climate change and onshoring.Higher commodity prices will stem from the greenmovement—we call it the green premium. Butcommodities are not created equal. Copper, natu-ral gas and lumber will have a supercycle, but if wetalk about steel, I would say that it only applies toclean steel.What commodity are you most bullish on?Natural gas. Our team sees a 50% increase in globalgas consumption from now to 2035. It’s the leastoffensive fossil fuel and is needed to supplementthe grid because renewables like wind power are

MACKENZIE GLOBAL RESOURCE FUND II (SERIES F)ANNUALIZED % TOTAL RETURN*

1-YEAR 54.5

5-YEAR 12.5

SINCE GERVAIS’S START 7.1DATE (MAY 2004)

S&P GLOBAL NATURAL RESOURCES INDEX ($CDN)

1-YEAR 30.0

5-YEAR 11.0

SINCE MAY 2004 7.8

* RETURNS TO MAR. 31, 2022; SOURCE: MORNINGSTAR DIRECT

SMART MONEY

BENOIT GERVAISSENIOR VICE-PRESIDENT, PORTFOLIO MANAGER, HEAD OF THE RESOURCE TEAMMACKENZIE INVESTMENTS

Benoit Gervais began his career during the lastcommodity boom and wasn’t prepared for a 13-yearbear market that ended in early 2021. Many resourcefunds shuttered and peers lost their jobs. ButGervais, 48, and co-manager Onno Rutten retooledtheir resource funds so they all took on a global andsustainable investing approach. The assets of their fivefunds total $1.5 billion and include Mackenzie GlobalResource II. It has always had a world mandate, and hasoutpaced the S&P Global Natural Resources Index overfive years and almost matched it since Gervais startedrunning the fund in 2004. We asked him why he usesenvironmental, social and governance (ESG) criteriaand is bullish on natural gas producer Tourmaline Oil.

Nearly every company has puttogether a policy on equity,

diversity and inclusion – but whatdo these terms really mean? SalwaSalek, chief equity, diversity, andinclusion officer at Desjardins Group,believes that it’s about acceptingpeople for who they are andguaranteeing the same treatment foreveryone.

“Having EDI [equity, diversityand inclusion] in our organizationsgives us an opportunity to rebalanceand ensure that everyone is treatedfairly by addressing barriers andideologies,” Ms. Salek explains. “Asour society becomes more diverse,it ensures that the company is ableto tap into all the best talent andperspectives.”

More than just a moral imperative,it’s become clear that organizationswith a strong EDI plan outperformtheir competitors, Ms. Salek adds.These companies report higherrevenues, happier and healthieremployees, less turnover, increasedproductivity, greater innovation, andmore creativity.

Positive mental health outcomesare also a welcome benefitof prioritizing equity, diversityand inclusion, says CharmaineAlexander, a plan sponsor service

advisor in disability managementand prevention at DesjardinsInsurance. Ms. Alexander is alsoa certified mental health first aidfacilitator through the Mental HealthCommission of Canada.

“Teams that have a livedexperience of EDI understand thattheir workplace is safe,” says Ms.Alexander. “When they feel thattheir employer has taken the timeto educate people and leadersabout equity, diversity and inclusion,employees feel that their individualvoices are being heard. Employeeswant to contribute and be a part oftheir employer’s success.”

Ignoring equity, diversity andinclusion can have negativeramifications on employee mentalhealth. “If you feel that you aren’tbeing treated equally, you might holdback,” she says. “You may not feelsafe to voice opinions.That has adirect effect on mental health.”

Desjardins Insurance understandsthat strong mental health supportsand EDI initiatives are somethingthat employees are looking for intheir employers. “Previously, peoplewere motivated by salary, by title orby position, but that’s not the caseanymore, especially through thepandemic,” Ms. Alexander explains.

PUTTING EDI PLANS INTO PLACEMs. Salek says that successfulEDI plans start at the top with chiefexecutive officers who include thoseprinciples in the organization’s toppriorities. “As much as we havecommitted to a top-down approachwith our EDI goals, we count on everyperson, at every level, and all thosewho engage with us, to contribute tothis eco-system,” she says.

Equity, diversity and inclusionpractices aren’t just about hosting aworkshop or making some additionsto your company policies.They’reabout creating a new ecosystemin your organization.To start, Ms.Salek suggests creating a plan andprioritizing it.

“Ensure buy-in from leadershipand hold them accountable,” shesays. “It is a business concern if wewant to hold on to employees in acompetitive market where millennialschoose their employers based ontheir values.We won’t be sustainableif we can’t retain them.”

Once plans are put in motion,there should also be a systemin place to collect and analyzedata. “Listen to your employees tounderstand what you have and whereyou need to go,” Ms. Salek says.“That will serve as the measure of

your EDI efforts.” She also remindsleaders that EDI must address equity,diversity and inclusion in equalmeasure. A diverse workforce thatis not treated equitably or made tofeel included won’t move the needle.“They must all be present with everyaction taken,” Ms. Salek explains.

Leaders can also look outsidetheir organization to trusted partnersin EDI to help enhance initiatives andofferings. Catalyst, the BlackNorthInitiative and Pride at Work are threegreat non-profit organizations toengage with, Ms. Salek suggests.

Ms. Alexander adds that EDI andmental health can “no longer bepushed to the background.”

“Employers can’t say ‘we’ll dealwith that later’ or ‘we’ll wait until wehave more money or more resources’– the pandemic has pushed theseissues to the forefront,” explainsAlexander. “You can still startintroducing EDI practices – evensmall changes can make an impact.”

Desjardins Insurance refers toDesjardins Financial Security LifeAssurance Company.

SPONSOR CONTENT • Advertising feature produced by Globe Content Studio with Desjardins Insurance. The Globe’s editorial department was not involved.

How workplace equity,diversity and inclusion practices

foster mental healthTo work effectively, EDI initiatives need buy-in from the top

Desjardins Insurance refers to Desjardins Financial Security Life Assurance Company.Desjardins®, Desjardins InsuranceTM and related trademarks are trademarks of the Fédération des caisses Desjardins du Québec used under licence byDesjardins Financial Security Life Assurance Company.200, rue des Commandeurs, Lévis (QC) G6V 6R2 / 1-866-647-5013desjardinslifeinsurance.com

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Since 1993, the Best Managed Companies list, presented by Deloitte, has recognizedexcellence among private Canadian-owned enterprises. This year, we profile 29 new-comers in a wide range of industries, from retail to dentistry to horticulture—plus one$5-billion-a-year metals manufacturer with 5,500 employees and 85 outposts in NorthAmerica. The companies that made the cut join 452 repeat winners that must requalifyeach year to stay on the list. To read more about the methodology, see page 48.

CANADA’SBESTMANAGEDCOMPANIES2022


NERVESOFSTEEL

Colin Osborne, Samuel’s outsider CEO

Giant metals manufacturer Samuel, Son & Co. hassurvived for five generations (and landed a spot onthe 2022 Canada’s Best Managed Companies list)by being a family-owned firm with none of the drama

BY JOE CASTALDO

PHOTOGRAPH BY PHILLIP CHIN

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aren Fenton joined Samuel, Son & Co. in 2008 and almost felt likeshe’d slipped back in time to the mid-1970s. The head office was

filled with workers in blue suits and ties. Layers of management werestacked atop one another like sediment on a cliff face, while the com-pany president stood at the summit and made most of the decisions. The

human resources department, where Fenton worked, was not viewedas a partner within the organization, but more like a kid sibling to be

kept busy with perfunctory tasks. She was only there because Sam-uel had purchased her employer, a processor of flat-rolled metal

products, and she didn’t know if she wanted to stay.

But Fenton did stay, and earlier thisyear she was appointed chief peopleofficer of Samuel, an industrial manu-facturer and metals company. In thenearly 15 years since, she’s witnessedand participated in its transforma-tion—Samuel is less hierarchical, itmoves faster, and more employees canmake their own decisions. “It’s a worldaway from where we were before,” shesays. Fenton is careful not to criticizetoo much. “That’s not to say we werein a bad place,” she clarifies. After all,Samuel has existed for longer thanCanada has been a country. Clearly, it’sbeen doing a lot of things right. It’s justthat when a company is 167 years old,some refreshing can be in order.

Founded by the brothers Samuel in1855, the firm is one of those unglam-ourous and unsung industrial stalwartsthat flies below the radar while wield-ing a sizable presence. Samuel, basedin Oakville, Ont., employs about 5,500people in Canada, the U.S. and Mexico.It has around 85 facilities—at least onein every province, six in Mexico, andmore than 40 in the U.S. At any giventime, some two million tons of metalare coursing through its operations,servicing customers in industries span-ning automotive, aerospace, defenceand construction.

It does just about everything youcan think of with steel and aluminum.

Samuel will polish it, pickle it, shape it,or flatten it to a level plane. It churnsout parts for electric vehicle manufac-turers; uncoupling levers for rail cars;sub-assemblies for aircraft; aluminumextrusions for windows, doors and RVs;tanks and pressure vessels for oil andgas storage; and custom componentsloaded on to satellites and blasted intospace. You get the picture—unexcitingfabricated components and industrialservices without which many busi-nesses could not function. Oh, it alsohas a printing and labelling group, anda transportation and logistics companytucked in there.

Samuel has proven adept at forecast-ing industrial trends and placing smartbets. Its biggest customer, for example,is Tesla—not just in its automotivegroup, but overall. Samuel now churnsout aluminum panels that later getturned into doors, roofs and hoods forother electric vehicle makers, includ-ing Rivian, Lucid, BMW and Toyota.

It adds up to a conglomerate thatgenerates about $5 billion in annualrevenue. “It’s one of the most complexmakeups of an industrial company ofits size that I’ve ever seen,” says ColinOsborne, Samuel’s president and CEO.Osborne is only the sixth CEO in thecompany’s long history. For much of itsexistence, Samuel has been run day-to-day by an actual Samuel, and its first

non-family CEO was only appointedin 2000. The company is still family-owned, now by the fifth generation ofSamuels, who have ranked among thewealthiest families in Canada. (Theirnet worth was estimated at $1.6 billionin 2016.)

Family businesses don’t have thebest reputations these days. The ste-reotype is that they are riven withjealousy, animosity and petty squab-bling. Recall the turmoil at RogersCommunications Inc. last year, whichpitted chair Edward Rogers againsthis mother and his sisters, and led toa bizarre situation in which two rivalboards of directors claimed authorityover the telecom firm.

Samuel hasn’t lasted this long despitebeing family-owned, but because of it.The stability and long-term view thatfamily ownership can bring has enabledSamuel to do things that a publiclyheld corporation might have a hardertime justifying to shareholders, even ifits corporate culture has lagged untilmore recently. On that front, Osbornesays it’s a little ironic Samuel has beennamed one of Canada’s Best ManagedCompanies: “What I’m really trying todo is manage less.”

oday, Samuel, Son & Co. has threeequal owners: siblings Mark and KimSamuel, and Rick Balaz, a retired Sam-uel executive who was married to theirsister, Tammy. In 2008, Tammy diedof cancer, and her stake went to Balaz.

Three generations of Samuels (leftto right): co-founder Lewis Samuel;his son, Sigmund; and Sigmund’s grandsonErnie, who set up Sam-Son Farm

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The fifth generation (counter-clockwise fromtop): Mark Samuel, his sister Kim Samuel,Rick Balaz and Tammy Balaz—Rick’s wife,and Mark and Kim’s sister, who died in 2008

The three do get along, in case youwere wondering. “It’s really importantthat we respect each other,” says Kim,62. “That doesn’t mean we don’t havedisagreements, either. That’s one of theresponsibilities, to make sure that yourdifferences never get in the way of thebusiness.”

That business began with her great-great-grandfather and his brother,Lewis and Mark Samuel, who leftBritain and set up shop in what’s nowdowntown Toronto in 1855 to importand export steel. The company, M&LSamuel, was eventually taken over byLewis’s son, Sigmund, who renamed itSamuel, Son & Co. and opened a branchin Montreal.

By the early 1960s, Samuel was a$6-million company that primarilyhoused and distributed steel. Sigmunddied in 1962, and his grandson Ernietook over. He wasn’t born a Samuel—he was a Willinsky, after his father.Ernie’s parents divorced when he wasyoung, and he and his mother moved inwith Sigmund. He asked his grandsonto legally assume the Samuel name, andafter graduating from the engineeringprogram at the University of Toronto,Ernie joined the company.

A tal l , debonair man with theuncanny ability to recall everybody’sname, Ernie took Samuel in new direc-tions. He started a packaging business,a transportation arm (he named it Kim-Tam, after his daughters) and branchedinto manufacturing, a division that waslater spun off into a publicly tradedcompany called Samuel Manu-Techin 1985. (It was brought back in-housein 2010.) Aside from business, Erniewas fanatical about horses and set upa prestigious training and breedingoperation called Sam-Son Farm, withoutposts in Ontario and Florida. Onrace days, Ernie could be spotted in a

cowboy hat, surveying the track withbinoculars.

Ernie suffered a severe brain injuryin 1997 and fell into a coma for threemonths. Though he recovered, he hadto step back. In 2000, his wife, Eliza-beth, became chair of Samuel, and thecompany appointed its first outsideCEO. Mark, meanwhile, became CEOof the publicly traded manufacturingcompany. Ernie died of cancer thatsame year at age 69.

Tammy took over the horse farm,and in 2006, Mark became chair of thecompany. Kim, meanwhile, was alreadyrunning the family’s charitable foun-dation. Growing up, she was neverexpected to go into the business. “It’salways bugged me a bit that there wasnot an expectation,” she says, add-ing she believes it was partly becauseof her gender. Kim worked at Samuelduring the summers while study-ing geography at U of T, and later intrade negotiations during the draft-ing of the North American Free TradeAgreement. She returned to Samuel todevelop an environmental complianceand sustainability structure before tak-ing over the foundation. (In 2017, shefounded the Samuel Centre for SocialConnectedness, a non-profit focusedon overcoming social isolation.)

Mark also worked at Samuel from ayoung age and then set off to completea degree in history and literature atHarvard University. His plan was totake a job in management consultingbefore pursuing an MBA, but whenErnie suffered a mild heart attack in1986, Mark returned to Canada to workfor the family firm. He never left, tak-ing on increasingly senior positions.In 2006, he became chair of the par-ent firm, overseeing a period in whichSamuel expanded in Mexico, weath-ered a recession and branched into new

areas of manufacturing.Importantly, all three owners have

been willing to let outside profes-sional managers do their jobs. Mark,for example, was CEO of Samuel Manu-Tech when the parent company priva-tized it in 2010. After the transaction,“there was only room for one seniormanagement team and one CEO,” Markrecalled over email. He was content tolet Samuel’s then-CEO, Wayne Bas-sett, continue running things, while hefocused on being executive chair. Simi-larly, after Samuel brought in a newCEO, Rick Balaz felt it was time to retirein 2015. “He wanted to make a numberof changes, and I sort of felt like I was inthe way,” Balaz says. “I think it was bestfor the company.”

In recent years, Samuel has imple-mented governance structures tostrengthen the business. Kim advo-cated for a board with independentdirectors after Ernie died and ensuredthey had votes. “I pushed hard withinmy family that we should have inde-pendent directors because it wouldbe good for the business,” Kim says.“There wasn’t really a reason we hadn’thad it before. It just had never reallycome up.”

That Samuel has carried on to thefifth generation is impressive, even ifthe fragility of family dynasties is per-haps more myth than reality. Take, forexample, the third-generation curse,which refers to the grandkids’ uniqueability to squander their legacy. Anarticle in the Harvard Business Reviewargued the concept was popularizedby a single study from the 1980s, whichfound only a third of family businessesmade it through the second generation.The study focused exclusively on man-ufacturing companies in Illinois anddid not compare family-owned busi-nesses to other kinds of companies.

rancesco Policaro’s father immigrated to Canadafrom southern Italy in the mid-1960s with his two

brothers, looking for a better life.They found it after becomingentrepreneurs in the automotive industry, eventually growingthe family business into one of the leading luxury automotiveretailers in southern Ontario.

The three brothers found their way within the automotiveworld in Canada, working their way up to land a positionon a dealership sales floor. In 1979, they bought into theirfirst Policaro dealership, the seed of what would becomeBrampton, Ont.-based Policaro Group, a $500-million a yearbusiness with just over 400 employees.

It seemed inevitable that Francesco would eventually endup in the automotive industry following his father and uncles’footsteps.

“The first time I ever earned a dollar was because I wasable to say the word Honda as a toddler,” says Francesco, 45,who began selling vehicles in high school.

But he has approached the business a little differently sincetaking over as chief executive officer in 2017.

“A lot of who I am today is because of what I learnedfrom my father and uncles,” he says. “But also, I think ourexecutive management team and our management stylewithin our organization is very different than what it was

How the Policaro Groupis challenging theautomotive experience

because we’ve grown. I think that’s part of the evolution ofnot only our company, but also management in general.”

In 2020, the company sold two dealerships, one Hondaand oneToyota, as part of a strategic move away frommass-market automobiles toward luxury vehicles. It recentlyacquired JaguarWaterloo, Land RoverWaterloo andVolvoCarsWaterloo, and is building three new dealerships invarious Ontario markets: BMW Etobicoke, Porsche CentreKitchener-Waterloo and Porsche Centre Niagara.

“That, combined with the start of our Policaro PerformanceDivision and our Policaro Leasing Division just last year,makes it the biggest growth phase in our history,” he says.“Our ability to do that, and to grow that quickly, is becausewe’ve built an organization and a centralized approach thatallows us to scale.”

Policaro Group has embraced the industry’s technologicalevolution and, earlier this year, an in-house proprietaryplatform was acquired by Quebec-based Kimoby softwareand communications development company.

The AI-driven ACE Marktplace software developed bythe Group launched as Policaro Access at the height of thepandemic and offered, among many other things, multipleoptions for purchasing vehicles including home delivery withUber-like mobile phone tracking technology.

“That platform will hopefully be in thousands of cardealerships across Canada and the United States and that’ssomething that was developed in-house,” he says. “That’salways been part of our makeup, to try and improve andevolve.”

The company has centralized management and acustomer- and employee-centric culture, he says.

Recruiting and training are important to delivering aboveand beyond customer expectations for luxury brands,he says.To do that, Policaro Group offers sector-leadingemployee benefits such as the Policaro LivingWage foremployees starting their careers in automotive and multiplewellness initiatives.

In 2018, the company established the Policaro Foundation,which invests in the future of our youngest and mostvulnerable by supporting pediatric centres in hospitals andcommunities where it has a presence, and the Policaro FetalCardiac Fellowship atThe Hospital for Sick Children inToronto.

“We’re not just a company that is bottom-line driven,” hesays.

Policaro Group is still a family business, with 11 membersof the second and third generations involved.

“It is built on strong family values,” he says. “We look atour own lives and the way that we want to treat each other,our own family, our friends and our communities.Thesevirtues that make a good person, they also make a goodcompany.”


Francesco Policaro,CEO, Policaro GroupF


A Samuel warehouse in Mississippi, where employees areworking on rail cars and heavy construction projects (left);the company’s carbon coil inventory field in Hamilton (right)

A different study, published in the jour-nal Royal Society, examined publiclytraded firms between 1950 and 2009,and found companies had a half-life ofjust 10 years, which barely amounts to ageneration. Meanwhile, a 2018 study byCredit Suisse found that family-ownedfirms grow faster and generate bettermargins than their peers.

What research has generally shownis that family-owned companies have along-term view and avoid rash movesfor a quick payoff. That’s somethingColin Osborne saw first-hand when hejoined Samuel.

n engineering graduatefrom McGill University, Osborne hasalways worked in the steel industry,including a stint as COO at Stelco. Hewas recruited as president of Samuelin 2015, with the agreement that hewould also later be its CEO. (He wasappointed to that role in 2019.)

Osborne then embarked on an odys-sey to learn the ins and outs of thesprawling conglomerate, overseeingall three major divisions (automotive,manufacturing and its metals servicecentre), visiting every facility andmeeting with employees. “When youget to the role of trying to figure outstrategy and capital allocation and allthose other things, it’s not easy unlessyou understand the product and theend market,” he says.

Osborne had two main goals when hejoined: set up the company’s assets for

the long term and update the corporateculture. On the first point, Samuel hadmade many acquisitions over the years,some more opportunistic than strate-gic. Taking a hard look at the portfolioand determining where to focus timeand money was a necessary task.

He’s pushed heavily into aluminum,and Samuel recently decided to invest$85 million to build an extrusion facil-ity in Mexico, across the border froman existing plant. That’s on top of a newaluminum plant in Tennessee it openedin 2015 and upgrades to another inBrantford, Ont., a few years later. Boththe rapidly growing solar and electricvehicle industries are craving alumi-num; in the case of EVs, the metal islighter than steel, helping to compen-sate for the added weight of batteries.Samuel formally began its relationshipwith Tesla in 2017, and Osborne givesthe credit to the company’s automotiveteam. “People in our automotive groupwere quite prescient, like, we see thisshift from steel to aluminum, and weneed to position ourselves appropri-ately,” Osborne says. Demand for alu-minum is so strong that Samuel’s saleshave surged between 500% and 600%in the past few years.

The company has also branchedinto additive manufacturing, which iskind of like manufacturing in reverse.Instead of starting with a hunk of metaland whittling away at it, additive man-ufacturing uses specialized machinesthat build custom parts from powder.To enter the field, Samuel invested ina local company called Burloak Tech-nologies in 2017 and bought the wholething three years later. So far, Samuelhas built custom parts for satellites,turbines and the nuclear industry.Osborne views it as a disruptive tech-nology—it can produce parts that arevirtually impossible to make through

other means, it shortens supply chains,and it results in less waste. “The viewof the owners was, let’s invest in it,”Osborne says.

Such investments are made with along-term view; the plant in Tennessee,for example, wouldn’t be profitable foryears. That’s one of the advantages ofworking for Samuel, Osborne says. “Inever hear people talking about quar-terly results.”

Company culture was his other majorpriority. Samuel had already changedfor the better over the years. KarenFenton, in her role in the HR depart-ment, pushed hiring managers to con-sider job candidates who had outsideexperience—not just, say, experiencein the steel industry. When it cameto promotions, Samuel reflexivelyfavoured employees with tenure, asopposed to newer workers who mightbe more deserving. “Over time, we’vegotten people to understand that con-cept and then see the value of bringinggreat new people in,” she says.

Osborne pushed the companytoward a more decentralized manage-ment structure. He’s a big proponent ofempowering employees to make deci-sions. While taking courses at HarvardBusiness School, he came across a casestudy about Fred Smith, the founderand CEO of FedEx. “He would tell astory about why FedEx is so agile. If asnowstorm shuts down Chicago, youdon’t need to have a meeting witha bunch of executives,” he says. “Thepeople at the ground level, they under-stand the intent, which is to get a pack-age there tomorrow.”

At Samuel, Osborne wants employ-ees closest to the problem to be makingthe decisions, a message he keeps rein-forcing within the company. About 120Samuel managers have also attendedThayer Leadership programs at West

A

efore the pandemic, GSoft’s general manager MartinGourdeau had to explain to friends and family what his

company did. Not anymore.The Montreal-based maker of employee experience

software has been in high demand since the pandemic led tothe big shift in more people working from home.The companyhas been fielding a growing number of calls from companies

How GSoft became thego-to tech company foremployee experience

looking to use their software platforms such as ShareGate,Officevibe and Softstart.

While the Montreal-based tech company, created in2006, is “very much under the radar,” Mr. Gourdeau says it’sexpanding rapidly and aims to hire 200 more staff this year,bringing its total headcount to 500.

“The business is in a really exciting place right now,” hesays, after taking time in 2021 to “recalibrate” and bring inthe right management systems and structure to support itsannual 30-per-cent revenue growth goals.

In 2021, the company grew by about 20 to 30 per cent,bringing in more than $100-million in recurring revenue.

“It’s a big jump. But it’s tied to a strategy,” he says. “Theway GSoft is positioned in the market right now… we can saythe stars have aligned; it’s our moment to shine.”

GSoft’s products are made for a remote or distributedworkforce, which quickly became commonplace amid thepandemic.

ShareGate, created in 2009, helps IT administrators migratetheir operations to the cloud and effectively use Microsoft365 andTeams. Officevibe, created in 2013, is an employeeengagement tool allowing managers to work better with theirteams and gather honest feedback.The newest addition,launched in 2021, is Softstart, an onboarding platform to helpcompanies welcome new staff with ease – whether theycome into an office or are remote.

The remote or hybrid workplace, especially for knowledgeworkers, is here to stay, Mr. Gourdeau adds.

This new work environment is putting “huge pressure”on companies to ensure they have the right technology inplace to bring new staff on board, stay on top of employeeengagement and provide the right technology tools forefficiency.

“Our products help companies ensure they’re well-positioned to capitalize on the latest market trends,” heexplains.

GSoft plans to expand its product portfolio, which is thefocus of its innovation laboratory, GLab. It’s where co-founderand chief executive officer Simon De Baene and his team buildprototypes of new products they can test in the market.

“We want to keep building a portfolio of products thatfacilitate work, making it faster and simpler in this distributedwork environment,” Mr. Gourdeau says.

The company aims to fill gaps between its existing productsor expand those programs; or it may acquire products thatalready exist in the market, he says. For example, the team islooking at in-person office activities that now may have to bereplaced with technology.

“We’re in the process of defining that list,” he says. “Thenumber of opportunities is quite high.”


GSoftgeneral managerMartin Gourdeau

B

Point Military Academy to upgradetheir skills. “You get to critical mass,”he says. “Once you get that happeningand people start acting that way, it justbuilds huge momentum.” Osborne hasseen the results—such as when thenU.S. president Donald Trump slappedtariffs on Canadian steel and aluminumin 2018. Samuel pushed decision-mak-ing down to each plant and reorganizedits supply chain in a few short weeks tomitigate the impact.

Osborne keeps bureaucracy to aminimum and stays updated through aweekly one-hour meeting with seniorleaders. He also prepares a separatemonthly report for the owners andboard. It would be unusual to go a weekwithout getting a phone call from atleast one member of the Samuel family,asking about some aspect of the busi-ness. “They’re very engaged but veryhappy to leave management to us,”Osborne says.

Mark, 58, retired from the board in2019, and Samuel appointed its first non-family chair. By then, Mark had otherpriorities: a young family and his roleas vice-president of the InternationalEquestrian Federation. (Mark is anaccomplished show jumper himself.)

Lately, the three of them have beenturning their attention to the future.There are seven family members in thesixth generation, ranging in age from10 to 30. None are currently employedat Samuel, though Balaz’s daughter didwork in the marketing division for atime. “That’s probably an area wherewe are weak, and we do have to bemore focused on bringing the next gen-eration along,” Balaz says. That entailslearning about Samuel and understand-ing their role as future owners.

Looking ahead also forced the familyto make a difficult decision. Sam-SonFarm, the horse breeding operation, hasalways been an odd fit with a steel com-pany. When Ernie started it in 1972, hemade it part of the parent firm, ratherthan hive it off as a separate entity.With both Ernie and Tammy no longeraround to tend to it, the farm becameeven more of an outlier. In 2020, thefamily decided to disperse its breedingand racing stock, with the intent to winddown operations completely. “Anythingwe can do to tie up loose ends whilewe’re still able to is a good thing—to beable to hand over a much cleaner busi-ness to the kids when the time comes,”Balaz says.

History always looms large with Sam-uel, but it has to keep looking ahead,just as it’s done for the past 167 years.

To make arrangements for an Appointment Notice, please call1-800-387-9012 or email [email protected]

Jill Oudilto Chair of the

Board of DirectorsThe Canadian RealEstate Association

Larry Kaumeyerto CEO

Ducks UnlimitedCanada

Jean Bedard,Q.C., Q.ARBto Counsel

Conlin Bedard LLP

Charles Sousa,MBA, ICD.D

to Board of DirectorsIC Savings

Linda Gillespieto Senior VP and

Chief HumanResources Officer

Cogeco

Colette Taylorto COO

Sovereign Insurance

Lauren Kenneyto Chief People

OfficerStarlight Investments

JUNE 2022

CongratulationstotheserecentappointeesPhillip Crawley, Publisher & CEOof The Globe and Mail, extends bestwishes to the following individualswho were recently featured in theReport on Business Section ofThe Globe and Mail newspaper.Congratulations on your newappointments.

Yaprak Baltaciogluto Board of Directors

Deloitte Canada

uilding a strong corporate culture is a common goalfor companies today, but it was less so when Nicola

Wealth opened its doors nearly three decades ago.Founder John Nicola was an industry trailblazer when he

built the private wealth management firm on a team-basedfoundation with the goal of creating shared value for clientsand employees.

Mr. Nicola started his namesake firm in 1994 to provideintegrated wealth management services with a focus oncomprehensive planning – everything from investmentmanagement to insurance, tax, business and estate planning– long before this holistic approach became popular in thewealth management sector.

The company further differentiated itself in the industry byestablishing a quarterly profit-sharing program that enablesall employees to participate in its success.The firm recentlyevolved this program by introducing an optional employeeshare purchase program.

Nicola Wealth’ssuccess powered byits people and culture

“From the beginning, our company was guided by theprinciples of teamwork and sharing, which has become ourfoundational value known throughout the company as ‘Sharethe Pie,’” says Jamie Duncan, NicolaWealth’s chief operatingofficer who has been with the company since its inception.

“We share our best knowledge and expertise with ourclients; we work together to build a company that we can allbe proud of; and we share the company’s success with ourpeople and with our communities, both globally and locally,who need our help.”

Two factors that set NicolaWealth apart: its planning-first approach and pension-style investment strategy thatincludes alternative assets like real estate and mortgages,private equity and private debt; and a bespoke clientexperience.

The company has grown from eight employees and$80-million in assets under management to about 400employees and more than $11.5-billion in assets today.

Growth is a strategic objective for the independent firmwith a priority focus on Ontario, both organically and throughstrategic acquisitions.The company now has multiple officesin the GreaterToronto Area. NicolaWealth also continuesto grow its B.C. operations, including offices inVancouver,Kelowna and Richmond and plans for a new office inVictoria.Its goal is to become the largest non-bank private wealthcounsel firm in Canada by 2025, with $25-billion in assets.

“Surpassing this target will come from executing ourmission well, operating in alignment with our corporatevalues and ensuring that our culture successfully scales withour growth,” Ms. Duncan says.

The company’s focus on its five strategic pillars will helpit get there including: a bespoke client experience; peopleand culture; corporate growth; investment product andperformance; and operational excellence.

She says NicolaWealth also understands that continuingto deliver a superior client experience through significantgrowth (it has a 99-per-cent client retention rate to date)requires an equal focus on the employee experience and theculture that supports it.

While culture is everyone’s responsibility, the companyboasts a strong, experienced People and Culture team whodesign and deliver solutions that enable people to develop totheir full potential while building a robust internal and externaltalent pipeline for future growth.The philanthropic heart ofthe company’s culture is the Nicola Gives Back Committee,which includes volunteers who support its philanthropicefforts and manage the allocation of corporate donations.

“Our culture and values act as our north star to guide ourcontinued growth and change,” Ms. Duncan says. “We’reworking together to build something meaningful that makesa difference to our clients, our people and our communities.We are committed to ensuring that everybody shares in thesuccess.Who wouldn’t want to be a part of this journey?”


Jamie Duncan, chiefoperating officerat Nicola Wealth,says the firm’sgrowth is guidedby the principlesof teamwork andsharing.

B


team means giving people the freedom totake risks. “It won’t always work out, butwe learn from it, and we move forward.This level of trust and respect is critical tobuilding a strong work culture.”

Mentor future leaders early

Adfast Canada Inc.(Saint-Laurent, Que.)160 employees4.4 years average service per employee

Since its founding more than 40 yearsago, this adhesive and sealant manufac-turer grew from a handful of employeesand a small production line to a firm with$70 million in revenue. It’s a family busi-ness, but no one gets a free ride: Adfast’sco-presidents only ascend to their rolesafter gaining many years of experience.Co-president Cindy Dandurand, grand-daughter of Adfast’s founder, says men-torship began early in her journey—shestarted as director of production 16years ago, before cycling through vari-ous departments. “The former president

A healthy culture affordsthe freedom to take risks

123Dentist(Toronto and Vancouver)3,400 team members250+ practices

Co-founder and CEO Dr. Amin Shivjilearned the fundamentals of leadershipcutting grass and working at McDonald’s.His family emigrated from Tanzania toVancouver when he was seven and, asa young adult, he took any job he couldfind. “With each one, I realized the keyto success is connecting with others andworking on a team,” he says. “The rela-tionships I had with colleagues made mewanttogotowork.”Acommonsentiment,perhaps, but a poignant one for the headof a dentistry network with hundreds ofpractices and thousands of employeesunder its umbrella. And how do you knowyou’re in a good relationship, business orotherwise? Permission to make mistakes.Shivji says having a high-performing

The leaders of the latest crop of Canada’s BestManaged Companies share the managementlessons that have helped them succeed

MEETTHENEWSCHOOLT

BY LIZA AGRBA

PHOTOGRAPHS BY DANIEL EHRENWORTH


Logistik Unicorp(Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Que.)2,000+ employees600,000 workers dressed worldwide,including 320,000+ Canadians

When Canadian soldiers and theirallies in countries like Australiaand Germany suit up for combat orsupport roles, there’s a good chancethey’ll be wearing gear made byQuebec clothier Logistik Unicorp.Diplomat Louis Bibeau launchedthe company in 1992, parlaying asmall tie maker (which still existsas a separate company calledBenart) into a major supplier tothe military and other governmentagencies. The idea that started it all:deliver a turnkey supply solutionstretching from product designand manufacturing to inventorymanagement.

Thousands of Canadian ArmedForces members deal with thecompany directly using onlineaccounts that allow them to punchin their measurements and ordereverything from shirts to parkas.But its client base goes far beyondthat. Logistik provides uniformsand outerwear for Canada Postmail carriers, as well as clothing forparks employees, first respondersand transit workers, among others.When some of this business driedup during the pandemic, it wona contract to supply millions ofmedical-grade protective gowns forhealth care workers.

Logistik today is working onsome high-tech stuff—think radiofrequency ID technology. Notsurprisingly, the company doesa lot of R&D, and it’s constantlyworking on smarter fabrics andgreener fibres in an effort to bemore sustainable and source rawmaterials locally. “We just did atrial for milkweed,” says KarineBibeau, Logistik’s vice-presidentof client experience and Louis’sdaughter. “We’re using it forinsulation instead of polyester.”Used as flotation for downed pilotsin World War II, the weed has fallenout of favour in recent decadesthanks to synthetic fibres. Now,however, it could see a renaissancethanks to Logistik—coming soon toa uniform near you. /Nicolas Van Praet


Bondi Produce & Specialty Foods(Toronto)175 employees8 million packages moved from the warehouse annually

Even the greatest of Ontariochefs can’t do muchwithout great ingredients.Increasingly, they go toBondi Produce & SpecialtyFoods. Its 80,000-square-foot distribution centrein Toronto—along witha fleet of 40 trucks thatdeliver to more than 750restaurants and food serviceestablishments within a300-mile radius of the cityevery day—are a long way

from the station wagon itsfounder, Ignazio Bondi, usedto deliver the food whenhe started the business in1976. But his grandson EzioBondi says the principle isthe same. “Our mission isto curate and deliver thebest produce and specialtyfood ingredients,” says thevice-president and third-generation Bondi. Whilethe company focuses onfresh fruits and vegetables,

its roster of products alsoincludes wild and porcinimushrooms, truffles,imported olive oils and“everything in between.”

Though the company isstill primarily a middlemanbetween farmers andrestaurants, it had to takemore of an active role oncepandemic restrictionscaused restaurants to shutdown. “We had a bunch ofinventory that was dying


with 550 retail partners. “I had what I callvalues equity,” he says. “Don’t let the lackof monetary equity dissuade you frombringing your ideas to life.” Espousingvalues like kindness, reliability and adapt-ability might not seem groundbreakingtoday, but they didn’t necessarily reflectthe cultural backbone of the average autoexporter in the 1990s. Of course, some val-ues only hold until they’re tested; in a tes-tament to AEC’s people-first philosophy,it didn’t lay off a single employee duringthe pandemic, helped dealers that had toshut down during lockdown and offeredflexible terms to struggling clients.

Make customers’ trust your priority

Automobile en Direct.com Inc.(Saint-Constant, Que.)465 employeesProjected 2022 sales volumeof 20,000 vehicles

Used-car dealers don’t always have areputation for transparency. So this pastNovember, Automobile en Direct—which sells used cars online and ownsfour dealerships in the Montreal area—made a big move to enhance customertrust. Salespeople became customerexperience specialists and shifted to afixed-salary model rather than one basedon commissions. “That way, they’re ableto advise customers to find a vehicle thatmeets their real needs, in complete trans-parency and without a commission influ-encing the transaction,” says founderand CEO Sébastien Bisaillon. And everycar on the lot gets a rigorous 200-pointinspection before going up for sale. Thefirm’s long-standing focus on trust andopenness has garnered it a solid cus-tomer base south of the border: Sales tocustomers in the U.S. represent roughly50% of its business. “It’s a new territorythat we’re still learning and adjusting to,”says Bisaillon, “but a very rewarding one.”

Stand behind your services

Carrington Group of Cos.(Edmonton)724 employees48 years in business

Carrington Group’s business is buildinghomes—namely single and multifamilydwellings in Alberta, B.C. and Arizona.Its Lifestyle Options division is focusedon housing for seniors, where dementiacare is a top priority. In a bid to stay aheadof the latest and best in care practices,

stayed on for many years to ensure aprogressive and successful transfer,” shesays. Another secret behind Adfast’s suc-cess? A history of gender-neutral teamsat the helm. “Adfast has always been co-managed by women and men, which per-mits a wonderful balance of ideas, per-spectives and shared decision-making.”Two years into her role, Dandurand’sfather still coaches her and co-presidentNicolas Choquet on a daily basis.

Systematize culture and repeat,repeat, repeat

Aquifer Group of Cos.(Saskatoon)150 employees15,000+ inventory SKUs

This Saskatoon-based provider of plumb-ing, heating and water-treatment prod-ucts started as a water service company in1968. As the business grew, organizationalculture became increasingly impor-tant. In 2017, the company systematizedits culture in what it calls the “AquiferAdvantage”—a list of 32 fundamentalbehaviours, generated with input fromstaff, that are critical to the long-term suc-cess of the business. It’s not just collect-ing dust on a bulletin board somewhere,either. Each week, a single fundamental—like “Treasure, protect and promote ourreputation”—is highlighted at internalmeetings and sent out in the form of anotice written by a staff member, a rolethat rotates week to week. Employeeseven review a scenario highlighting thefundamental’s importance and answera few multiple-choice questions aboutit. Director Glenn Wig is clearly a firmbeliever in this old bit of advice: Repeti-tion is the mother of learning.

Keep your values front and centre

Auto Export Corp.(St. Catharines, Ont.)180 employees46% sales growth in 2021

When AEC founder and CEO AndrewPilsworth made his first sale in 1996, it wason a wing and a prayer. With no inven-tory to speak of and $200 to his name, apassionate conversation about his rock-solid values philosophy attracted a cli-ent and secured an upfront payment ofaround US$300,000 for 10 trucks froma local dealer. Pilsworth leveraged theprofit from that sale into what’s now aglobal automotive solutions provider

on us that we needed tomove out,” says Bondi. Sothe company launched itsown home delivery service,using a third-party logisticsprovider to send ingredientsdirectly to home cookswho want their food to bethe very best. Like manychanges wrought by thepandemic, this one’s hereto stay. “By no means arewe going to become likeGrocery Gateway, but we’vegot a hardcore loyal fan basethat supported us throughCOVID-19,” says Bondi,“and we’re going to keepthe doors open with them.”/Jaime Weinman


Carrington implemented the Butterflymodel—a comprehensive culture-changeprogram centered on dignity and emo-tional well-being for those with dementia.It touches everything from managementpractices to health care, and among its keytenets are providing attentive compan-ionship for individual patients and con-sciously designed spaces that maximizedignity and quality of life. The effects ofthe program have been staggering, result-ing in a 90% reduction in residents’ medi-cations and a significant decrease in staffillnesses. For CEO Dan Slaven, Butterfly’ssuccess was a natural consequence of oneof his key business principles: “You mustbelieve in and stand behind the productsand services you provide.”

See pressure as a privilege

Centra Windows(Langley, B.C.)450 employees1 million+ windows manufactured

Pandemic supply chain issues continueto strain the construction sector, but forGarett Wall—CEO of this B.C.-based,employee-owned window manufac-turer—with every hardship comes oppor-tunity. For Wall, it’s all about mindset.“The more senior you become as a leader,the more critical your ability to handlesomething abnormal,” he says. “I seepressure as a privilege. Sometimes thatperspective will be hard to see at first,like with the pandemic. We all dealt withthe uncertainty and fear, but what did welearn from it? How will it shape us?” Toget on top of supply chain snarls, Centradiversified its glass suppliers and stayedin the game. And with more than threedecades in the business, Centra benefitsfrom a loyal customer base—no smallboon in a troubled time. “We’ve beenamazed and humbled by the understand-ing of our customers as we navigate acomplex new world together,” says Wall.

Good things come to those who wait

CMP Advanced MechanicalSolutions(Chateauguay, Que.)200+ employeesOpened its first zero-carbon manufacturingfacility in 2022

Hustle culture is notorious for its focuson instant results, but for Steve Zim-mermann, president of this fabricationand machining company, good business

is all about patience and perseverancein the face of problems that take time tosolve. “Leaders need to understand thatchange doesn’t happen overnight, and itdoesn’t always flow smoothly from mile-stone to milestone,” he says. “They needto have the patience to allow the team toidentify areas for change, provide themwith the guidance and mentorship theyneed to plan an effective response, andthen allow them the time to make thosechanges and improve performance.” Theslow-but-steady approach is paying off:100% of CMP’s manufacturing is guidedby instructions created by Visual Knowl-edge Share software, commercialized byCMP as a separate business unit in 2013.

Institute a formal successionplan early

Groupe Park Avenue(Brossard, Que.)1,000+ employees21 dealerships

Without a solid succession plan, pass-ing the torch in a third-generation fam-ily business like Groupe Park Avenuecan be chaotic. Founded by Norman D.Hébert Sr. in 1959, the automotive dealer-ship company—which sells wheels fromJaguar, Mercedes and BMW, to namea few—takes a conscious, meticulousapproach to succession planning that hasso far yielded a smooth transition acrossgenerations of Héberts. When NormanE. Hébert Jr. left his law career to takeover as CEO in 1991, he established aformal family council moderated by anexternal coach, which gives the Hébertsa safe space to share their ambitions forthe firm and plan for its future. In 2013,a third-generation Hébert, Norman John,left his senior consulting job at OliverWyman to serve as VP and GM at one ofits dealerships. He’s since been promotedto COO, and if history is any lesson, he’spoised to lead his family’s company oneday soon.

Invest in your team first

Inflector EnvironmentalServices(Ottawa)355 employees663% three-year growth

“In business, you are encouraged to makeinvestments that will take your organiza-tion to the next level. In my experience,the best investment you can make for

New Look VisionGroup Inc.(Montreal)3,000 employees120+ brands including Ray-Ban,Tom Ford and Cartier

It’s been roughly a year sinceNew Look Vision went privatein a bid to shield its financialsecrets and speed up its U.S.expansion—and Antoine Amielhasn’t looked back. The CEOof Canada’s biggest eyewearretailer has consolidationon his mind, a plan totransform what was once asleepy regional player into acontinental giant.


your business is in your people,” saysJeff Clarke, CEO of the environmentalcontracting firm Inflector. To that end,Clarke doesn’t mind providing competi-tive compensation packages above theindustry average. The right people, hesays, will naturally create a more profit-able environment, making it well worththe cost. Likewise Inflector’s tendencyto promote from within: Show your peo-ple you’re invested in their growth, andthey’ll amply return the favour. “Imaginehaving a team whose members are allworking at their greatest potential, whobelieve they can make a difference atyour company, who believe in themselvesbecause you supported them on this pathto confidence and self worth—this is ateam that drives your company forwardalong with them,” says Clarke.

Keep your team’s skills current

LCI Education(Montreal)2,000 faculty20,000 students on 23 campuses

It’s only natural for an education networkto prioritize continuous schooling forits employees. Company policy dictatesthat each team member take charge of anannual personal development plan, whichmandates 40 hours of training (or 80 formanagers) in line with their performanceevaluations and skills profiles. From in-house training to conferences, languagecourses, technical certification or evensomething as simple as reading a specificbook, the particulars are secondary to themajor goal: using education to propel theteam toward its maximum potential. Onein-house program brings 40 employeesfrom around the world to a dedicatedtraining week. “Not only does it alloweveryone to enrich their knowledge anddevelop new skills, but it also contrib-utes greatly to the feeling of belonging,”says CEO Claude Marchand. “We firmlybelieve in the continuous development ofour staff to anticipate new trends, adaptto changes in the industry and developsolid technical skills.”

Adapt or die

MedSpa Partners(Toronto)400+ employees95% female team

When COVID-19 hit, it could’ve been thedeath knell for MedSpa Partners. The

Investors barely had timeto bank the proceeds fromthe $1-billion sale to privateshareholders (led by U.S.private equity firm FFLPartners and Quebec’s CDPQ)before Amiel made his nextdeal, buying New York–basedLuxury Optical Holdings. In asingle stroke, Amiel took overthe biggest high-end opticalretailer in the United States,a 34-store operation with apresence in premium marketslike Manhattan, Beverly Hillsand Miami. What’s next? Moreof the same. There are manymore targets out there, andwithin two to three years, theCEO says New Look should

have a U.S. luxury network ofseveral hundred stores.

Retailers are having atough time supplying upscaledesigner glasses, and the reasonhas nothing to do with supplychain issues, Amiel says. “It’sjust a big, big demand—muchbigger than before.” Productsfrom luxury houses like Cartierare highly coveted at themoment, the CEO says. Andbecause luxury eyewear hasmore customization, it requiresmore time to manufacture. Thegood news: The bigger NewLook gets, the higher it rankson luxury providers’ deliverylists. Asian water buffalo–hornframes, anyone? /NVP


Brookdale Treeland Nurseries Ltd.(Schomberg, Ont.)175 employees (plus 600 part-timers during peak season)5 million plants sold annually

What’s the next big thingin Canadian gardening? JeffOlsen is betting one topseller will be the braidedwillow, an ornamentaltree with thin trunksweaving in and out of eachother and topped with acrown of leaves. “It’s justvery unique,” Olsen says.“Gardeners are interestingcats, because they startit as a hobby, and then itbecomes a passion andthen an obsession. All of a

sudden, they’re searchingfor new, new, new. And soanything that’s weird andwacky and different seemsto catch their attention.”

Olsen is CEO of BrookdaleTreeland Nurseries, oneof the country’s biggestwholesale plant growers.The company suppliesmajor retailers like Loblaws,Costco and Home Depot,stocking their gardensections with a mix of newand time-tested plants, and

providing plant care whenneeded. It also handles theretailers’ online orders,shipping directly from itsgrowing sites to customers’homes. Brookdale’s totalgrowing area: 600 acres.Greenhouse space: 1 millionsquare feet.

Thousands of Canadiansstarted gardening for thefirst time or rediscoveredit during the pandemic,whether it was growingtheir own vegetables or

simply enjoying a smallplant. More and more ofthose people are buyingonline, and if you’veever wondered just howdifficult it is to make surethat a live, flowering plantarrives to a customer’shome damage-free and inbeautiful condition, youneed to talk to Olsen. “It’s avery complicated process,”he says. Some things areimpossible to ship, like ahanging basket of flowers.So, what’s the biggest plantyou can order to your homethat will still make it thereintact? “Probably a four-footcedar tree.” By the way, itstill has to arrive in fourdays or it’s toast. /NVP


company—which acquires medical aes-thetics clinics—was only six months oldwhen, suddenly, it had to close all its loca-tions. Instead,within24hours, it launchednew telehealth-based virtual consulta-tions supported by marketing campaigns.That allowed the firm to keep a criticalmass of team members employed dur-ing lockdown, gave patients somethingto look forward to once clinics reopenedand kept cash flowing in. “Very rarelydoes a strategic or even tactical plan playout as expected,” says CEO Dominic Maz-zone. “Success, in most cases, is birthedfrom a series of recoveries from unfore-seen setbacks—and that can be prettypainful at times. Adaptability is the great-est trait any person or business can have.”

Enjoy the journey towardsustainable growth

Norbec(Boucherville, Que.)260 employees136,000 tonnes of food in Norbec facilities

Sustainability may be the buzziest ofcorporate buzzwords, but for Norbec,the concept goes in two important direc-tions. Manufacturing durable, high-per-formance insulating solutions—namelymetal panels and prefabricated walk-incoolers and freezers—keeps environ-mental sustainability at the forefront ofcompany policy. Meanwhile, happy, moti-vated employees fuel sustainable growth.“Norbec has a strong culture focusedon customers and people,” says CEOJan Lembregts. “Despite our significantgrowth in the past decade, this culturehas continued to thrive. The journey ofworking well together and having fun atwork every day is more important thanthe destination.” When collaborationand joy on the job are part and parcel ofeveryday business, people come to workmotivated to do their best.

Find your North Star

Norda Stelo Inc.(Quebec City)720 employeesProjects in 50+ countries

When a slew of corruption charges lev-elled Quebec’s construction industry adecade ago, Norda Stelo (formerly Rocheltée) was at the centre of the controversy.A thorough rebrand was in order, andby 2015, the engineering consulting andconstruction firm had a new name whose

literal meaning is North Star—a sym-bol of its commitment to a better way ofdoing business. “We decided to get backto basics, finding what we’re good at andour distinctive strengths,” says CEO AlexBrisson. “We chose to work with clientsthat shared our belief in long-term part-nerships and core values. Now, we placeour employees and clients at the centre ofall our decisions. That is the North Starwe follow.” That includes a strict code ofethics and conduct that spells out poli-cies around transparency, anticorruptionand conflicts of interest. “We wish to havea positive impact on communities andthe environment with each project,” saysBrisson, “and build a sustainable futurefor generations to come.”

Lead with a light touch

P3 Veterinary Partners Inc.(Oakville, Ont.)590 employees490,000 annual patient visits

When co-founders Bruce Campbell andDr. Nicole Judge—who handle adminis-trativeandmedicaloversightof theveteri-nary practice group, respectively—met in2015, they quickly realized they’re of onemind when it comes to leadership. Con-ceived as a bridge between the resourcesof a corporate operation and the commu-nity feel of a small hospital, P3 emphasizesleadership by way of empowering peopleto exercise their professional judgment.They call the approach a “consultativeand light touch,” believing practitionersin direct contact with cases are in the bestposition to make life-or-death decisions.Dr. Judge, whose title is chief medical offi-cer, sees herself as a facilitator and sound-ing board, there to advise rather thancommand. On the admin side, Campbellencourages critical thinking and auton-omy within a set of standards and proto-cols. “If we invest our time in removingthe barriers between our colleagues andtheir purpose—in our case, patient careand client service—more patients get thecare they need,” says Campbell.

Treat everyone like family

Policaro Group(Brampton, Ont.)402 employees$17.50 base wage

“The virtues that make a good personalso make a good company,” says Fran-cesco Policaro, CEO of the family-owned


retail automotive group. “We look at ourown lives and the way we want to treateach other, our family, our friends andour communities.” The scale of this com-pany may have grown dramatically sinceits 1979 inception, but its culture revolvesaround the family values on which it wasfounded. A minimum $17.50 hourly wageis one way the company does right by itspeople. To track worker engagement andhappiness, Policaro prioritizes feedbackfrom an anonymous survey platform, andit’s clearly paying off: A quarter of thefirm’s employees have been there for atleast five years. The family values thesisapplies inside and outside the organiza-tion: In 2018, Policaro established a chari-table foundation that supports every-thing from food banks and toy drives tofetal cardiac fellows at SickKids Hospital.

If you want to build a ship…

Radicle Group Inc.(Calgary)109 employees7 million tonnes of CO2 reduced

Radicle Group’s CEO, Saj Shapiro, cen-tres his leadership on a piece of philoso-phy from Antoine de Saint-Exupéry: “Ifyou want to build a ship, don’t drum uppeople to gather wood, divide the workand give orders. Instead, teach them toyearn for the vast and endless sea.” Radi-cle, which uses proprietary software andother measures to help companies reduceemissions and trade carbon credits, is ona quest to make a positive impact on theplanet, and Shapiro works hard to keephis team aligned with that mission. Staffdiscuss the firm’s four core values—open-mindedness, boldness, excellenceand trust—at each meeting. And to fos-ter open communication, team memberscan report levels of engagement andemotional well-being on their cellphoneswith specialized software. “This led usto develop our own unique Radicle lan-guage that is heavy on emotional aware-ness,” says Shapiro. “It opened up trans-parent discussions among all levels.”

Mastermind Toys(Toronto)2,000 employees250,000 custom loot bags filled each year

If you’ve seen children workingout with a bright red Bopper Bagor tossing around an inflatableball that looks like a lava lamp,you might have seen a customerof Mastermind Toys. Despitethe retro look of its exclusivebest-seller, the Neon RainbowPlayground Ball, there’s nothingold-fashioned about the way theToronto-based retailer operates.Founded in 1984 as the somewhatstodgy-sounding Mastermind:The Educational Computer Storeby brothers Andy and Jon Levy,it grew into a coast-to-coastbusiness, going from 11 storesto 68 during the past decade(its biggest markets are Ontarioand Alberta).

A toy company needs tochange fast to keep up withhigh customer turnover, butMastermind Toys changedespecially fast in 2020, when JonLevy—who retired in 2019 asthe company’s only CEO—wasreplaced by Sarah Jordan justweeks before the pandemic hit.But the engineer, who previouslyspent nine years workingwith Fortune 500 companiesat Boston Consulting Groupand then joined Scotiabankas a senior vice-president of

customer experience, found thatMastermind Toys had a solidculture that could withstand anychange. The retailer’s secret,Jordan says, is that it takes toysvery seriously. Mastermind’s“play experts” focus on howdifferent play patterns supporta child’s development, whichmeans every toy, puzzle and gamein its stores is recommendedbased on the skills it will helpchildren to develop. (Thatincludes its new sub-brand,Mastermind Toys Baby.) Theyalso curate toys by age anddevelopment rather than gender,says Jordan, to help spread themessage that “all types of play aremeant for all kids.”

One of Jordan’s priorities evenbefore the pandemic upendedtraditional retail was to expandMastermind’s digital business,which accounted for less than5% of sales when she took overand saw triple-digit growth in2021. She also expanded its PlayGuides, a curated list of productskids might want, from once a yearto year-round, changing the toysto match the changing seasons.Though it’s never the wrongseason for a Neon RainbowPlayground Ball. /JW

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Bogert says that propping up the teamwith both practical and moral support isa major part of its growth strategy. “Theysay that people don’t care how much youknow until they know how much youcare,” he says. “I live by that expression.Having people show up to do their bestwork every day isn’t just about metricsand targets—it’s about a human touch.For instance, if someone is having an issueat home and needs to take the day off,you have to be there for them.” Likewise,Bogert says it’s important employees seetheir time with the company as a poten-tial career, and not just a job—to that end,he prioritizes promoting from within andproviding training when needed. Thegoal is a workforce that knows what todo with minimal instruction; Bogert seescatalyzing team growth in this respect asa key part of his role as CEO.

Three additional newcomers to theBest Managed Companies list: GroupeOuellet Canada Inc. (L’Islet, Que.), LFournier et fils (Val-d’Or, Que.) andTrudell Medical Ltd. (London, Ont.).

Know when it’s time to step aside

Samuel, Son & Co.(Oakville, Ont.)5,500 employees85 facilities worldwide

To read about how Samuel, Son & Co. hassurvived five generations of family own-ership, read “Nerves of steel” on page 28.

Never forget your core mission

Seafair Capital Inc.(St. John’s)1,019 employees50 sites in the province

Early in 2020, Seafair Capital laid outits growth strategy, a key part of whichwas leveraging its knowledge, experi-ence and culture in new ways. It turnedout to be good timing for a soon-to-bepandemic-era company whose businesshas historically revolved around deliver-ing community care services. “When thepandemic hit, the strategy went into highgear,” says CEO Anne Whelan. With laserfocus on its stated mission of “unlockingpotential,” Seafair became an innovationpartner with Eastern Health (the largesthealth authority in Newfoundland andLabrador), pivoted to helping small andmid-sized enterprises manage payrolland bookkeeping, and launched an indus-try-leading online training module forcommunity-based care. It also started anin-house innovation hub to generate newideas. “Your ‘return on luck’ can be eitherpositive or negative,” adds Whelan. “Thepandemic was and is a bad-luck event forour business, but our return on luck isdefinitely positive.”

Build the team of the future

Tri-Mach Group(Elmira, Ont.)305 employees6 facilities across North America

When Krystal Darling looks back on herearly years as CEO of Tri-Mach, whichmanufactures food processing equip-ment, she wishes she’d known the impor-tance of thinking ahead when it came tobuilding her team. “As entrepreneurs, wehave this independence mentality of, ‘IfI do everything myself, I can achieve mymilestones faster,’” says Darling. “Thereality is, while you may get there faster,

you won’t go further in the long run with-out the right team around you.” Now, Dar-ling focuses on hiring for personality andvalues, even if it’s tempting to quickly fillseats with people who have all the req-uisite hard skills for a given role. It maytake more time and investment to trainthe right recruits, but Darling says it’sabout identifying the people allied withyour company’s long-term future—andthat means careful interviewing to sussout those who truly align with its missionand values.

Make it a career, not a job

Urban Life Solutions(Calgary)900+ employeesServes 100+ cities, towns andmunicipalities

In the next three years, this outdoor carecompany—which provides services likelandscape management, towing and roadsweeping—is poised to double in sizethrough a combination of organic andacquisition-driven growth. CEO John

Established in 1993, Canada’s BestManaged Companies, presented byDeloitte, recognizes excellence amongprivate Canadian-owned companies. Thisyear is The Globe and Mail’s first as theprogram’s media sponsor.

To be eligible for the Best Managedprogram, companies must beheadquartered in Canada and haverevenue of $50 million or more. Theyalso must be privately owned, includingprivate-equity portfolio companies,Canadian-owned co-operatives or thosethat are foreign-owned with Canadian-based headquarters; private companieswhere the management team resides inCanada; or closely held Canadian-ownedpublic companies with fewer than 50%of shares or units traded.

Each applicant undergoes a multistepevaluation of their management abilitiesand practices across four pillars:strategy, culture and commitment,capabilities and innovation, andgovernance and financials.

In terms of strategy, Canada’s BestManaged Companies must have aformal methodology for strategydevelopment, ensure the strategyreflects all stakeholders, have the rightcapabilities and metrics in place toexecute, and clearly and consistentlycommunicate the strategy to all levels ofthe organization.

Best Managed Companies must alsoprove their culture and commitment bybuilding a strong corporate culture andlegacy, actively develop their peopleand leadership team, provide a holisticcompensation system, and addresscontinuity issues with the company.

To show their capabilities andinnovation, Best Managed Companiesdevelop valuable capabilities andresources, are highly execution-oriented,are focused on productivity andinnovation, and are thoughtful abouthiring the right people to execute theirbusiness model and strategy.

For the fourth pillar, governanceand financials, Best ManagedCompanies are expected to installstrong governance structures, use keyperformance indicators to manage theirprogress, maintain a strong balancesheet, and apply the financial disciplinerequired to drive revenue growth,improve operating margin and increaseasset efficiency.

For 2022, there are 29 new BestManaged Companies on the total list of481. The remaining 452 companies aredivided into three groups based on thenumber of years they’ve been includedin the program. Best Managed winners:two to three years; Gold Standardwinners: four to six years; Platinum Clubmembers: seven-plus years.

CANADA’S BEST MANAGED COMPANIES

METHODOLOGY

INDIGENOUS OWNED.COMMUNITY DRIVEN.

MembertouDEVELOPMENT CORPORATION

WWW.MEMBERTOU.CA


AAG Tailored Cutting SolutionsBurlington, Ont.

Acadian ConstructionDieppe, N.B.

Accès Location +Beloeil, Que.

AirSprint Inc.Calgary

Almita PilingEdmonton

AvernaMontreal

BE Power EquipmentAbbotsford, B.C.

Bee-Clean Building MaintenanceEdmonton

Behaviour InteractiveMontreal

BioScript SolutionsMoncton

Book Depot Inc.Thorold, Ont.

Canadian NorthKanata, Ont.

Chambers Transportation Group Ltd.Vernon, B.C.

Champion PetfoodsEdmonton

CofomoMontreal

Comptoir Agricole Ste-Anne Inc.Repentigny, Que.

Conestoga MeatsBreslau, Ont.

Crawford PackagingLondon, Ont.

De La FontaineSherbrooke, Que.

DuvaltexQuebec

Eddyfi/NDTQuebec

Elite Integrity ServicesCalgary

FYidoctorsCalgary

GrainsConnect CanadaCalgary

Groupe BeaucageSherbrooke, Que.

Groupe Boucher SportsSainte-Foy, Que.

Groupe Tornatech Inc.Laval, Que.

Gusto 54 Restaurant GroupToronto

H.H. Angus & Associates Ltd.Toronto

Henry’sToronto

HGrégoireSaint-Eustache, Que.

lg2Montreal

Inland Group of Cos.Truro, N.S.

Ironclad Developments Inc.Springfield, Man.

Magna IV Engineering Inc.Edmonton

Marco Group Ltd.St. John’s

Mattamy HomesToronto

MedicomPointe Claire, Que.

mform Construction GroupToronto

Mikisew Group of Cos.Enoch, Alta.

Miralis inc.Saint-Anaclet, Que.

MOBIADartmouth, N.S.

Modern Beauty SuppliesCalgary

Mondou (Groupe Legault)Montreal

MP Lundy Construction Inc.Ottawa

MuraflexMontreal

Naylor Building Partnerships Inc.Oakville, Ont.

Neighbourly PharmacyToronto

ORAM Plomberie du bâtimentMirabel, Que.

Osmow’sMississauga

Peavey Industries LPRed Deer, Alta.

PolykarSaint-Laurent, Que.

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Luke Hansen-MacDonald

David Savoie

Luc Bertrand

James Elian

Jeff Lloyd

François Rainville

Curtis Braber

Brian Gingras

Rémi Racine

Heather Tulk

Wilf Wikkerink

Chris Avery

David Chambers

Blaine McPeak

Régis Desjardins

Sébastien Fréchette

Arnold Drung

John Ashby

Gabriel de La Fontaine

Alain Duval

Martin Theriault

Shawn Kirwan

Al Ulsifer

Warren Stow

Daniel Beaucage

Martin Boucher

Manufacturing

Construction

Heavy machineryand equipment

Aviation

Industrial products

Testing andquality control

Manufacturing

Janitorial

Video games

Life sciencesand health care

Wholesale anddistribution

Transportation

Transportation

Retail

Informationtechnology

Agriculture

Meat processing

Industrial products

Manufacturing

Retail

Technology

Industrial products


Agriculture

Automotive

Retail

Dominic Bergeron

Janet Zuccarini

Harry Angus

Gillian Stein

John Hairabedian

Claude Auchu

Roger Langille

Craig Gilpin

Kelly Butz

Christopher Hickman

Brad Carr

Ronald Reuben

David Allen

Dan Gallagher

Daniel Drapeau

Rob Lane

Mike Jomaa

Pierre Leblanc

Sean Lundy

Fernando Petreccia

Tom Hitchman

Chris Gardner

Marie-Claude Allaire

Ben Osmow

Doug Anderson

Amir Karim

Manufacturing

Restaurants

Consulting

Retail

Automotive

Advertising

Transportation

Financial services

Engineering

Construction

Real estate


Construction

Government andpublic services

Manufacturing

Telecommunications


Retail

Construction

Manufacturing

Engineering


Industrial products

Restaurants

Retail

Manufacturing

BEST MANAGED 2 TO 3 YEARS ON THE LIST

COMPANY/HEADQUARTERS LEADER SECTOR COMPANY/HEADQUARTERS LEADER SECTOR

Welcome back to these 452 Best Managed Companies

STILLTHEBEST

WHY WE’RE EXCITED ABOUTFor over 40 years, Jayman BUILT has improved the quality of life for our

homeowners. When we see something that needs to be done in the future,we don’t wait. We start building it that way now.

Introducing our Net Zero Certified homes, which exceed the proposed2050 building requirements for energy efficiency, today. We strive to provide

a superior customer experience, award-winning home designsand sustainable building practices in every home we build.

We are leading by example in Canada.

It is an honour to be recognized as a Best Managed Platinum Companyfor 21 years. We would not be able to achieve this recognition without the

efforts of our dedicated team of employees, who keep us focusedtowards a better and brighter future.

J A Y M A N . C O M / N E T Z E R O


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Bryton Marine GroupVernon, B.C.

Campbell Bros. Movers Ltd.London, Ont.

Cando Rail & TerminalsBrandon, Man.

Caron Transportation SystemsSherwood Park, Alta.

CEDACalgary

ClearTech Industries Inc.Saskatoon

ClioBurnaby, B.C.

CMiCToronto

Cowater InternationalOttawa

Crystal GroupToronto

Delnor Construction Ltd.Edmonton

Deveraux Group of Cos.Regina

DIALOGToronto

Donna Cona Inc.Ottawa

DPI Construction ManagementToronto

Eddy Group Ltd.Bathurst, N.B.

Electrozad Supply Co. Ltd.Windsor, Ont.

Element Technical ServicesCalgary

emergiTEL Inc.Richmond Hill, Ont.

Energera Inc.Acheson, Alta.

Fillmore ConstructionManagement Inc. Edmonton

Firma Foreign ExchangeEdmonton

Fourgons Transit Truck BodiesLaval, Que.

Franchise Management Inc.Woodstock, N.B.

Fruit d’Or Inc.Villeroy, Que.

GeotabOakville, Ont.

Giraffe Foods Inc.Mississauga

Go AutoEdmonton

Groupe Atwill-Morin Inc.Montreal

Groupe DissanAnjou, Que.

Groupe IntersandBoucherville, Que.

Groupe RaymondGatineau, Que.

GSoftMontreal

Harnois ÉnergiesSaint-Thomas, Que.

Hopewell Group of Cos.Calgary

Index ExchangeToronto

JNE WeldingSaskatoon

Kohltech Windows and EntranceSystems Debert, N.S.

Préval AG Inc.Saint-Hyacinthe, Que.

Priestly Demolition Inc.King, Ont.

PUR Co. Inc.Toronto

QSLQuebec

Quinlan Brothers Ltd.St. John’s

Rockwood Custom HomesCalgary

Seasons Retirement CommunitiesOakville, Ont.

ShowcaseBrampton, Ont.

Sollio Groupe CoopératifMontreal

Spectrum Health CareToronto

State Window Corp.Vaughan, Ont.

Techo-Bloc Inc.St-Hubert, Que.

Turf Care Products CanadaNewmarket, Ont.

Wellington-Altus Private WealthWinnipeg

Westech Industrial Ltd.Calgary

AV Gauge & Fixture Inc.Oldcastle, Ont.

AG HairCoquitlam, B.C.

Agrocrop Exports Ltd.Bolton, Ont.

AIL Group of Cos.Sackville, N.B.

Airstart Inc.Mississauga

AltrumSt-Martin, Que.

AmiscoL’Islet, Que.

Anatolia Tile + StoneVaughan, Ont.

Arbor MemorialToronto

Armco Group of Cos.Halifax

Artitalia Group Inc.Montreal

ASL Paving Ltd.Saskatoon

Atlantic Coated PapersWhitby, Ont.

Bäckerhaus Veit Ltd.Mississauga

BarkmanSteinbach, Man.

Baylis Medical Company Inc.Mississauga

Biron Groupe SantéBrossard, Que.

BMI Canada Inc.Boisbriand, Que.

Bond Brand LoyaltyMississauga

Bradford Greenhouses Ltd.Springwater, Ont.

BrettYoungWinnipeg

Byron Bolton

Adam Campbell

Brian Cornick

Bruno Muller

Kevin Fleury

Randy Bracewell

Jack Newton

Gord Rawlins

David Baron

Roger Hwang

Glenn Cyrankiewicz

Denis Jones

Jeff DiBattista

John Bernard

Elvio DiSimone

Keith Assaff

William Smith

Jason Nikish

Aneela Zaib

J. Todd Van Vliet

Brent Fillmore

Dave Dominy

Louis Leclair

Greg Walton

Carl Blouin

Neil Cawse

Ari Powell

Jason Smith

Matthew Atwill-Morin

Mario Lamarche

Stéphane Chevigny

Alain Raymond

Martin Gourdeau

Serge Harnois

Sanders Lee

Andrew Casale

Adam Logue

Kevin Pelley

Fabien Fontaine

Ryan Priestly

Jay Klein

Robert Bellisle

Robin Quinlan

Allison Grafton

Mike Lavallee

Samir Kulkarni

Pascal Houle

Sandra Ketchen

Christopher Liberta

Charles Ciccarello

Paul McLean

Charlie Spiring

Jason Lapp

Tim Campeau

Graham Fraser

Yash Karia

Micheal Wilson

Robert Wills

Louis-David Bourque

Réjean Poitras

Berrin Elmaagcli

David Scanlan

George Armoyan

Antonio Vardaro

Drew Mitchell

David Granovsky

Adam Carr

Alan Barkman

Kris Shah

Caroline Biron

Marc Bouthillette

Robert Macdonald

Len Ferragine

Calvin Sonntag

Manufacturing

Transportation

Transportation

Transportation

Environmentalservices

Industrial products

Technology

Technology

Business services

Cosmeticsmanufacturing

Construction

Real estate

Architecture

Consulting

Construction



Oil and gas

Business services

Business services

Construction

Financial services

Manufacturing

Restaurants


Technology

Manufacturing

Automotive

Restoration



Construction

Technology


Financial services

Advertising

Industrial products

Manufacturing

Agriculture

Demolition


Transportation

Fisheries

Construction


Retail

Agriculture


Engineering

Retail


Financial services

Technology

Manufacturing

Manufacturing

Agriculture

Energy, resourcesand industrials

Aerospace

Business services

Manufacturing


Death care

Real estate

Manufacturing

Construction

Forestry and paper

Food manufacturing

Manufacturing




Business services

Agriculture

Agriculture


GOLD STANDARD 4 TO 6 YEARS ON THE LIST

hat doesn’t break you can make you stronger – if youlet it. It’s a lesson that helped Quebec-based Norda

Stelo Inc. rebuild itself to become one of the best managedcompanies in the engineering sector.

“We went through a major crisis, and the only way tosurvive it was to reinvent the company entirely, which we didwith our employees,” says Alex Brisson, Norda Stelo’s chiefexecutive officer.

More than a decade ago, corruption charges levelled theQuebec construction industry, and Norda Stelo, formerlyRoche ltée, was caught in the middle of the storm. By 2015,the employee-owned company rebranded as Norda Stelo,meaning “north star” – a symbol of the new company’scommitment to a better way of doing business.Thecompany reinvented itself by involving employees in keydecisions.

“Our transformation started with a group of 50 selectedemployees who brainstormed together, redefining thecompany’s core values for the future: Adaptability,Trust,Excellence, Innovation, Integrity and Respect.Trust withinthe workforce and trust with clients were a priority, given theongoing crisis. From then on, we had a plan in place which

How Norda Stelobecame one of theengineering industry’sbest managedcompanies

demonstrated our dedication to change the company’smentality,” Mr. Brisson says.

Guided by its “north star,” a series of strategic and tacticalplans served as roadmaps to both employee engagementand financial prosperity.The key to success was to set short-term goals, reaping a succession of successful outcomes,while building trust with clients along the way.

“After our first strategic plan came the second one,followed by the third, and slowly we began to see the light.At the beginning, we only saw it through a very small hole,but now our journey brought us into full light,” Mr. Brissonsays.

Norda Stelo’s ability to communicate its strategy to all theemployees on a regular basis, and its willingness to involvethem in strategic decisions, led the company to new ideasand opportunities, ensuring growth in a highly competitivemarket.

Today, the re-envisioned independent engineering firmspecializes in integrated projects in the urban infrastructureand transportation fields, as well as industrial sectors, suchas mines and metals, energy and manufacturing.

“In wanting to bring the best of us to our clients, we’vedecided to stick to what we do best, which is brownfieldengineering,” Mr. Brisson says.

“For decades, we’ve been working with our clients inimproving, modernizing, and adding true value to theirexisting facilities.”

Adds Mr. Brisson: “We believe that ‘brown is the newgreen” – and that by restoring, enhancing equipment’sperformance, and extending the life of existing facilities, apositive impact on both the environment and climate changecan be achieved, while significant value is added to theclients’ assets.”

The company refers to this as its “Asset Durabilitybusiness model “. They believe this is a game changer intheir world, where environmental, social and governance(ESG) considerations are becoming inevitable to ensure thesustainability of their client’s operations and growth.

Norda Stelo currently has 720 employees across Canadaand worldwide, including New Caledonia and Madagascar.

“The commitment to turning things around paid off,”Mr. Brisson says, adding that the company’s revenue isexpected to increase by 18 per cent this fiscal year, despitelabour challenges affecting the industry.

“At Norda Stelo, we care deeply about creatingsustainable growth for our clients.We’re all aboutemployees and clients that share the common desire towork together in a long-term partnership on building a betterfuture,” Mr. Brisson says.

True to its vision, Norda Stelo aims to mobilize thecollective intelligence towards the sustainability of itspartners’ assets, the communities and the planet.


Alex Brisson,Norda Stelo’s chiefexecutive officer

W

PROUD TO ENTER THEBEST MANAGED FAMILY 2022Discover engineering for a sustainable future

norda.comcollectiveingenuity.norda.com


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Terrapro Inc.Sherwood Park, Alta.

Toitures HogueBlainville, Que.

Traction on DemandBurnaby, B.C.

Transport BourassaSt-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Que.

Trotman Auto GroupSurrey, B.C.

Trotter & Morton Group of Cos.Calgary

Turkstra Lumber Company Ltd.Hamilton

UCS Forest GroupMississauga

Viva NaturalsNorth York, Ont.

VMACNanaimo, B.C.

Wesgroup EquipmentSurrey, B.C.

Weston Wood Solutions Inc.Brampton, Ont.

Whitewater West Industries Ltd.Richmond, B.C.

Wills Transfer Ltd.Smiths Falls, Ont.

Winters Instruments Ltd.Toronto

WoodbridgeMississauga

WZMH ArchitectsToronto

Zulu Alpha KiloToronto

A&W Food Services of Canada Inc.North Vancouver, B.C.

Acadian Seaplants Ltd.Dartmouth, N.S.

Adastra Corp.Toronto

AFD Petroleum Ltd.Edmonton

Agilus Work SolutionsEdmonton

Agri-Marché Inc.Saint-Isidore, Que.

All Weather WindowsEdmonton

Alliance Energy Ltd.Regina

Almag AluminumBrampton, Ont.

Altis Recruitment & excelHROttawa

Apollo Health and Beauty CareToronto

ArconasMississauga

Armour Transportation SystemsMoncton

Armstrong Fluid TechnologyToronto

Arpi’s Industries Ltd.Calgary

Artopex inc.Granby, Que.

ASL Distribution Services Ltd.Oakville, Ont.

Associated EngineeringEdmonton

Kruger Products LPMississauga

Lamour GroupMontreal

LayfieldRichmond, B.C.

Liberty Linehaul Inc.Ayr, Ont.

Location Brossard Inc.Dorval, Que.

LocweldCandiac, Que.

Logel HomesCalgary

M.I. IntegrationSherbrooke, Que.

Maritime Paper Products LPDartmouth, N.S.

Mary Brown’sMarkham, Ont.

McElhanneyVancouver

McKeil MarineBurlington, Ont.

Membertou Development Corp.Membertou, N.S.

Minard’s Leisure WorldWeyburn, Sask.

Mint Pharmaceuticals Inc.Mississauga

mobileLIVEToronto

Mulvey & BananiToronto

MyHealth CentreToronto

Nanometrics Inc.Kanata, Ont.

NautelHacketts Cove, N.S.

NightingaleMississauga

ONEC GroupEdmonton

OSL Retail ServicesMississauga

Payment Source Inc.Ottawa

Point S CanadaBoucherville, Que.

priMED Medical ProductsEdmonton

Quails’ Gate WineryWest Kelowna, B.C.

Regional GroupOttawa

Rocky MountaineerVancouver

Romet Ltd.Mississauga

SFMDorval, Que.

SharethroughMontreal

Source AtlanticSaint John

SpinriteListowel, Ont.

StemCell TechnologiesVancouver

Talbot MarketingLondon, Ont.

Tap & Barrel GroupVancouver

TargrayKirkland, Que.

Colin Schmidt

Jocelyn Hogue

Greg Malpass

Bourassa Jean

Mike Trotman

David Ryan

Peter Turkstra

Warren Spitz

Husayn Remtulla

Jim Hogan

Dhar Dhaliwal

Alan Lechem

Geoff Chutter

Terry Wills

Jeffrey Smith

John Zianis

Zenon Radewych

Zak Mroueh

Susan Senecal

Jean-Paul Deveau

Darren Edery

Parker McLean

Craig Brown

Patrice Brochu

Richard Scott

Bryan Leverick

Bob Peacock

Kathryn Tremblay

Richard Wachsberg

Dan Nussbaum

Vicki McKibbon

Todd Rief

Julie Berdin

Daniel Pelletier

Cole Dolny

Martin Jobke

Dino Bianoco

Martin Lieberman

Tom Rose

Brian Taylor

Guy Brossard

Michael Cyr

Tim Logel

Vincent Houle

Sheldon Gouthro

Gregory Roberts

Allan Russell

Scott Bravener

Terrance Paul

Susan Minard

Jaiveer Singh

Jahan Ali

Domenic Bonavota

Suresh Madan

Ian Talbot

Kevin Rodgers

Ed Breen

Denis Wiart

Brett Farren

Robert Hyde

Bruno Leclair

David Welsh

Anthony Stewart

Sender Gordon

Peter Armstrong

Brent Collver

Randal Tucker

Jean-Francois Cote

Steve Drummond

Ryan Newell

Allen Eaves

Steve Levschuk

Daniel Frankel

Andrew Richardson

Industrial products

Construction

Technology

Transportation

Automotive

Construction

Forestry and paper

Forestry and paper

Food manufacturing

Automotive

Heavy machinery


Manufacturing

Transportation

Industrial products

Manufacturing

Architecture

Advertising

Restaurants

Agriculture

Informationtechnology

Oil and gas

Business services

Agriculture

Manufacturing

Energy

Mining

Business services

Manufacuring

Industrial products

Transportation

Manufacturing

Industrial products

Indsutrial Products

Transportation

Consulting

Manufacturing

Retail

Industrial products

Transportation

Transportation

Utilities

Real estate

Automotive

Manufacturing

Restaurants

Engineering

Transportation


Retail


Technology

Engineering


Technology

Telecommunications

Manufacturing

Buiness Services

Business services

Technology

Automotive


Wineries andbreweries

Real estate

Transportation

Utilities


Technology


Retail

Technology


Restaurants

Resources

PLATINUM CLUB 7 OR MORE YEARS ON THE LIST


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C.A.T. HoldingCoteau-du-Lac, Que.

Cactus Restaurants Ltd.Vancouver

Campus Living CentresToronto

CANA Group of Cos.Calgary

Canad InnsWinnipeg

Canadian Tire Corp.Toronto

Canarm Ltd.Brockville, Ont.

Capital Paving Inc.Guelph, Ont.

CBCLHalifax

CBI HealthToronto

CCI Inc.Cochrane, Alta.

CenterLine (Windsor) Ltd.Windsor, Ont.

Central GroupMississauga

Challenger Motor FreightCambridge, Ont.

Chandos ConstructionEdmonton

Charger LogisticsBrampton, Ont.

Charm Diamond CentresDartmouth, N.S.

Cherubini Group of Cos.Dartmouth, N.S.

Avison YoungToronto

Bayshore HealthCareMississauga

BBAMont-Saint-Hilaire, Que.

BCF SENCRL LLPMontreal

BEST For a Cleaner WorldCoquitlam, B.C.

Bill Gosling OutsourcingNewmarket, Ont.

Bison TransportWinnipeg

Black Cat Wear PartsEdmonton

Blue Water GroupDartmouth, N.S.

Bodtker GroupCalgary

Boire & Frères Inc.Wickham, Que.

Borger Group of Cos.Rocky View County, Alta.

Boston Pizza International Inc.Richmond, B.C.

Boulangerie St-Méthode Inc.Adstock, Que.

Brandt Group of Cos.Regina

BroadGrain CommoditiesToronto

Brock SolutionsKitchener, Ont.

Burnbrae Farms Ltd.Lyn, Ont.

Daniel Goyette

Richard Jaffary

Ray Stanton

Luke Simpson

Dan Lussier

Greg Hicks

David Beatty

Geoffrey Stephens

John Flewelling

Jon Hantho

Brent Goerz

Michael Beneteau

Richard Eastwood

Daniel Einwechter

Tim Coldwell

Andy Khera

Richard Calder

Darren Czech

Mark Rose

Stuart Cottrelle

Jérome Pelletier

Jocelyn Poirier

Bruce Taylor

David Rae

Rob Penner

James Buxton

Patrick Wilson

Howie Kroon

Pierre Rivard

William Borger

Jordan Holm

Benoit Faucher

Shaun Semple

Zaid Qadoumi

Vivienne Ojala

Joe Hudson

Transportation

Restaurants


Construction

Hospitality

Retail


Construction

Consulting


Consulting

Automotive

Marketing

Transportation

Construction

Transportation

Retail

Manufacturing

Real estate



Business services

Business services

Business services

Transportation

Manufacturing


Industrial products

Agriculture

Industrial products

Restaurants

Food manfucturing

Industrial products

Agriculture

Industrial products

Food manufacturing



237

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256

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295

296

297

298

299

300

301

302

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304

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307

308

309

310

311

312

Flanagan FoodserviceKitchener, Ont.

FLOFORM CountertopsWinnipeg

Forest Group of Cos.Vaughan, Ont.

Fountain TireEdmonton

Fresh Direct ProduceVancouver

Friesens Corp.Altona, Man.

FWS Group of Cos.Winnipeg

G AdventuresToronto

G&L GroupConcord, Ont.

Genesis Hospitality Inc.Brandon, Man.

Gentec InternationalMarkham, Ont.

GenumarkToronto

Gerrie Electric Wholesale Ltd.Burlington, Ont.

GHY InternationalWinnipeg

Giampaolo GroupBrampton, Ont.

Giftcraft Ltd.Brampton, Ont.

Global RelayVancouver

GoodLife FitnessLondon, Ont.

Govan BrownToronto

GrahamCalgary

Grascan Construction Ltd.Toronto

Great Little Box Co.Richmond, B.C.

Greenfield Global Inc.Toronto

Gregg Distributors LPEdmonton

Groupe DeschenesMontreal

Groupe Germain inc.Quebec

Groupe MasterBoucherville, Que.

Groupe Montoni (1995) DivisionConstruction Inc. Laval, Que.

Groupe Novatech inc.Ste-Julie, Que.

Groupe Robert Inc.Rougemont, Que.

Groupe Savoie - Les RésidencesSoleil Boucherville, Que.

Groupe Trans-WestLachine, Que.

Harbour Air SeaplanesRichmond, B.C.

Harry Rosen Inc.Toronto

HatchMississauga

Home Hardware Stores Ltd.St. Jacobs, Ont.

Houle ElectricBurnaby, B.C.

HTSToronto

Coast Capital Savings Credit UnionSurrey, B.C.

Coleman’s Food CentresCorner Brook, N.L.

Conestoga Cold Storage Ltd.Mississauga

connectFirst Credit UnionCalgary

Contrôles LaurentideKirkland, Que.

Cooke Aquaculture Inc.Blacks Harbour, N.B.

Cowan Insurance GroupCambridge, Ont.

CroesusLaval, Que.

CrosbieSt. John’s

D2L Corp.Kitchener, Ont.

Dancor/CoreydaleLondon, Ont.

David Aplin GroupCalgary

Day & RossHartland, N.B.

Deca CablesTrenton, Ont.

dentalcorpToronto

Deslaurier Custom CabinetsOttawa

Diamond SchmittToronto

Dilawri’s Crown Auto GroupWinnipeg

Dillon ConsultingToronto

Driving Change AutomotiveGroup Ltd. Regina

Dufresne Group Inc.Winnipeg

Durabuilt Windows & Doors Inc.Edmonton

DynaLIFEDxEdmonton

E.B. Horsman & Son Ltd.Surrey, B.C.

E.C.S. Electrical Cable Supply Ltd.Richmond, B.C.

Eagle Professional Resources Inc.Toronto

EastlinkHalifax

EBC inc.L’Ancienne-Lorette, Que.

Eclipse AutomationCambridge, Ont.

Engineered AirCalgary

Equipment Sales & Service Ltd.Toronto

Esri CanadaToronto

Evertz Technologies Ltd.Burlington, Ont.

FarrowWindsor

Fengate Asset ManagementToronto

Fenplast Portes & FenêtresCandiac, Que.

First Industries Corp.Edmonton

Fisherman’s MarketHalifax

Dan Lafrance

Edward Sherritt

Domenic Gurreri

Brent Hesje

Davis Yung

Chad Friesen

Brent Clegg

Bruce Poon Tip

Pat Lamanna

Kevin Swark

Joel Seigel

Mark Freed

Heather Gerrie

Richard Riess

Joe Caruso

Todd Vore

Warren Roy

David Patchell-Evans

Joseph Kirk

Andy Trewick

Angelo Grasso

Robert Meggy

Howard Field

Gary Gregg

Francois Deschenes

Christiane Germain

Louis St-Laurent

Dario Montoni

Harold Savard

Michel Robert

Nataly Savoie

Réal Gagnon

Greg McDougall

Laurance Rosen

John Bianchini

Kevin Macnab

Chuck Phillips

Derek Gordon

Calvin MacInnis

Frank Coleman

Greg Laurin

Wellington Holbrook

Steve Dutin

Glenn Cooke

Janet Peddigrew

Sylvain Simpson

Rob Crosbie

John Baker

Danny Sanita

Jeff Aplin

Bill Doherty

Darrell Edgett

Graham Rosenberg

Jason Chartrand

Donald Schmitt

Ashok Dilawri

Sean Hanlon

Trevor Boquist

Mark Dufresne

Joe Sunner

Jason Pincock

Tim Horsman

Mohammad Mohseni

Janis Grantham

Jeff Gillham

Marie-Claude Houle

Steve Mai

Donald Taylor

Morgan Cronin

Alex Miller

Romolo Magarelli

Grant Robinson

Lou Serafini Jr.

Jean Marchand

David Leeworthy

Monte Snow


Retail

Construction

Automotive


Manufacturing

Business services

Travel

Industrial products

Hospitality


Retail


Customs agent

Manufacturing


Technology

Fitness and wellness

Construction

Construction

Construction

Manufacturing

Manufacturing



Hospitality


Real estate

Manufacturing

Transportation

Long-term care

Transportation

Transportation

Retail

Consulting

Retail

Energy

Industrial products

Financial services

Grocery

Storage

Financial services

Industrial products

Food manufacturing

Financial services

Technology

Oil and gas

Education


Business resources

Transportation

Manufacturing


Retail

Architecture

Automotive

Business services

Automotive

Retail

Manufacturing




Business services

Telecommunications

Construction

Industrial products

Industrial products


Technology

Technology

Customs agent

Financial services

Manufacturing

Transportation



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314

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341

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344

345

346

347

348

Klohn Crippen Berger Ltd.Vancouver

Kriska Transportation Group Ltd.Prescott, Ont.

Lakeside Process ControlsMississauga

Lanctot LtéeSt-Laurent, Que.

LemayMontreal

Les Emballages Carrousel Inc.Boucherville, Que.

Levitt-SafetyOakville, Ont.

Lindsay ConstructionHalifax

LMS Reinforcing Steel GroupSurrey, B.C.

Location d’outils Simplex s.e.c.Montreal

Long ViewCalgary

LornevilleSaint John

Losani HomesStoney Creek, Ont.

M. Sullivan & Son Ltd.Arnprior, Ont.

M&M Food MarketMississauga

Magasins Trévi inc.Mirabel, Que.

Maisons Laprise Inc.Montmagny, Que.

Maple Lodge Farms Ltd.Brampton, Ont.

Hunter Amenities International Ltd.Burlington, Ont.

HyLife Ltd.LaBroquerie, Man.

I.M.P. Group International Inc.Halifax

Imperial Manufacturing GroupRichibucto, N.B.

Integral Energy Services Ltd.Airdrie, Alta.

International Group Inc.Toronto

Island West CoastDevelopments Ltd. Nanaimo, B.C.

ITC Construction GroupVancouver

J Sonic Services Inc.Saint-Laurent, Que.

J.L. Richards & Associates Ltd.Ottawa

Jayman BUILT Group of Cos.Calgary

JefoSt-Hyacinthe, Que.

Johnston Group Inc.Winnipeg

Johnvince FoodsToronto

JV Driver GroupNisku, Alta.

K-Line Group of Cos.Stouffville, Ont.

Kaizen Auto GroupCalgary

Klick HealthToronto

Len Murray

Mark Seymour

Greg Houston

Diane Lanctot

Louis T. Lemay

Michel Bourassa

Bruce Levitt

Cory Bell

Ron McNeil

Euclid Véronneau

Brent Allison

Styve Dumouchel

Fred Losani

Robert Ball

Andy O’Brien

Benoît Hudon

Daniel Laprise

Michael Burrows

John Hunter

Grant Lazaruk

Kirk Rowe

Normand Caissie

Derek Polsfut

John Reucassel

Greg Constable

Doug MacFarlane

Jean Aucoin

Saverio Parrotta

Jay Westman

Jean Fontaine

David Johnston

Joe Pulla

Chuck Sanders

Mark Kellett

Nate Clarke

Lori Grant

Consulting

Transportation

Consulting


Architecture



Construction

Industrial products

Industrial products

Technology

Construction

Real estate


Retail

Retail

Construction

Food manufacturing

Manufacturing

Agriculture

Aerospace

Manufacturing

Business services

Oil and gas

Construction

Construction


Business services

Real estate

Agriculture

Financial services

Food manufacturing

Other

Energy

Automotive

Advertising


PROUD TO BE ONE OFCANADA’S BEsTMANAGEDCOMPANIES 2022


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350

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372

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374

375

376

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381

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383

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387

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393

394

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400

401

402

403

404

405

406

407

408

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410

411

412

413

414

415

416

417

418

419

420

421

422

423

424

PD Group of Cos. Inc.Edmonton

Pelican InternationalLaval, Que.

PenneconSt. John’s

peopleCare CommunitiesWaterloo, Ont.

PointClickCareMississauga

Polycorp Ltd.Elora, Ont.

Pomerleau Inc.Saint-Georges, Que.

PrairieCoast EquipmentChilliwack, B.C.

ProcomToronto

PTI TransformersRegina

Quadra Chemicals Ltd.Vaudreuil-Dorion, Que.

Quality FoodsQualicum Beach, B.C.

Questrade, Inc.Toronto

R.V. Anderson Associates Ltd.Toronto

Red Sun FarmsKingsville, Ont.

Rex Power MagneticsConcord, Ont.

RGO Group of Cos.Calgary

Richardson International Ltd.Winnipeg

RLG International, Inc.Burnaby, B.C.

RobinsonWinnipeg

RWDI Group of Cos.Guelph, Ont.

Sargent FarmsMilton, Ont.

Saskatchewan Mining andMinerals Inc. Chaplin, Sask.

Scandinavian Building Services Ltd.Edmonton

Servus Credit UnionEdmonton

Shah Canada Group of Cos.Woodbridge, Ont.

Shaw Group Ltd.Halifax

Sifton Properties Ltd.London, Ont.

SiriusXM CanadaToronto

Skyline Group of Cos.Guelph, Ont.

Solutions 2 GOBrampton, Ont.

Solvera SolutionsRegina

South Country Equipment Ltd.Emerald Park, Sask.

South Shore FurnitureSainte-Croix, Que.

Southmedic Inc.Barrie, Ont.

Southwest PropertiesHalifax

Spin Master Ltd.Toronto

St. Joseph CommunicationsToronto

Maple ReindersMississauga

Maritime TravelHalifax

Maritime-Ontario Freight Lines Ltd.Brampton, Ont.

MasterBUILT Hotels Ltd.Calgary

Mastronardi Produce (Sunset)Kingsville, Ont.

McCain Foods (Canada)Toronto

McDougall EnergySault Ste. Marie

McIntosh PerryWoodbridge, Ont.

MDS Aero Support Corp.Ottawa

MedcanToronto

Mega Group Inc.Saskatoon

MHS Inc.Toronto

Miller Waste Systems Inc.Markham, Ont.

Mircom Group of Cos.Vaughan, Ont.

Modern Niagara Group Inc.Ottawa

Modu-Loc Fence RentalsToronto

Molinaro’s Fine Italian Foods Ltd.Mississauga

Momentum technologies inc.Quebec

Morrison HomesCalgary

Mr. Lube CanadaRichmond, B.C.

Murray Auto GroupWinnipeg

Napoleon Group of Cos.Barrie, Ont.

Nicola WealthVancouver

Novexco Inc.Laval, Que.

NRT Technology Corp.Toronto

Number TEN Architectural GroupWinnipeg

O’Regan’sDartmouth, N.S.

Oceanex Inc.St. John’s

Odlum Brown Ltd.Vancouver

Omicron Canada Inc.Vancouver

OpenRoad Auto Group Ltd.Richmond, B.C.

Oppenheimer GroupCoquitlam, B.C.

Oxford Frozen Foods Ltd.Oxford, N.S.

Paladin Security GroupBurnaby, B.C.

Palliser Furniture Ltd.Winnipeg

Paterson GlobalFoods Inc.Winnipeg

PayworksWinnipeg

PCL Construction Group of Cos.Edmonton

Brian Tiessen

Danick Lavoie

David Mitchell

Brent Gingerich

Dave Wessinger

Peter Snucins

Pierre Pomerleau

JD Frame

Frank McCrea

George Partyka Jr.

Philip Infilise

Noel Howard

Edward Kholodenko

Shawn Scott

Carlos Visconti

Ara Hasserjian

Cathy Orr

Curt Vossen

Jerry Weisenfelder

Shea Robinson

Michael J. Soligo

Kevin Thompson

Rodney McCann

Russell Hay

Ian Burns Warner

Sujay Shah

Dean Robertson

Richard Sifton

Mark Redmond

Jason Castellan

Oliver Bock

Reg Robinson

Drew Watson

Jean Laflamme

Lisette (Lee) McDonald

Gordon Laing

Anton Rabie

Tony Gagliano

Harold Reinders

Rob Dexter

Doug Munro

David Donaldson

Paul Mastronardi

Max Koeune

Darren McDougall

Gus Sarrouh

John Jastremski

Shaun Francis

Kim Yost

Hazel Wheldon

Blair McArthur

Mark Falbo

Bradley J. McAninch

Clint Sharples

Guerino Molinaro

Mohamed Guetat

Dave Gladney

Stuart Suls

Doug Murray

Stephen andChris Schroeter

John Nicola

Denis Mathieu

John Dominelli

Greg Hasiuk

Sean O’Regan

Captain Sid Hynes

Debra Doucette

William Tucker

Christian Chia

John Anderson

Allan MacDonald

Ashley Cooper

Peter Tielmann

Andrew B. Paterson

JP Perron

David Filipchuk

Construction

Manufacturing

Industrial products

Long-term care

Technology

Manufacturing

Construction

Agriculture

Business services

Manufacturing


Grocery

Financial services

Architecture

Agriculture

Utilities

Business services

Agriculture

Business services


Consulting

Food manufacturing

Mining

Janitorial

Financial services

Food manufacturing

Manufacturing

Real estate

Media

Real estate


Technology

Agriculture

Retail


Real estate

Entertainment

Media

Construction

Travel

Transportation

Hospitality

Agriculture

Food manufacturing

Oil and gas

Consulting

Aerospace


Business services

Business services

Utilities

Manufacturing

Construction

Industrial products

Food manufacturing

Technology

Real estate

Automotive

Automotive

Manufacturing

Financial services


Technology

Architecture

Automotive

Transportation

Financial services

Construction

Automotive

Agriculture

Food manufacturing

Security

Manufacturing

Agriculture

Technology

Construction


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439

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United Van Lines (Canada) Ltd.Mississauga

Vector ConstructionWinnipeg

Vision Group CanadaMontreal

Waiward Industrial LPEdmonton

Wakefield Canada Inc.Toronto

Walters Group Inc.Hamilton

Westcorp Inc.Edmonton

Western Sales Ltd.Rosetown, Sask.

Weston ForestMississauga

WGI Westman Group Inc.Sunnyside, Man.

White Spot Ltd.Vancouver

Wildstone Construction GroupPenticton, B.C.

WilsonsHalifax

Wyth FinancialSaskatoon

Standard Products Inc.St. Laurent, Que.

StarTech.comLondon, Ont.

Steam Whistle BrewingToronto

Steele Auto GroupDartmouth, N.S.

StelproSt-Bruno-de-Montarville, Que.

Strike Group Ltd. PartnershipCalgary

Summer Fresh Salads Inc.Woodbridge, Ont.

Superior GloveActon, Ont.

Techmation Electric & Controls Ltd.Airdrie, Alta.

Tenaquip Ltd.Senneville, Que.

The Cahill GroupSt. John’s

Trico HomesCalgary

triOS College Business TechnologyHealthcare Mississauga

TuGoRichmond, B.C.

Anne Martin

Bob Spriggs

Mark Cohen

Andy Brooks

David Fifield

Peter Kranendonk

Philip Milroy

Grant McGrath

Steve Rhone

Paul Cunningham

Warren Erhart

James Morrison

Ian Wilson

Don Coulter

David Nathaniel

Paul Seed

Greg Taylor

Rob Steele

Yves Chabot

Stephen Smith

Susan Niczowski

Tony Geng

Derek Polsfut

Glenn Watt

Fred Cahill

Wayne Chiu

Frank Gerencser

Patrick Robinson

Transportation

Construction


Industrial products


Industrial products

Real estate

Agriculture


Manufacturing

Restaurants

Construction

Oil and gas

Financial services

Manufacturing

Technology

Food maunfacturing

Automotive

Industrial products

Oil and gas

Food manufacturing

Industrial products

Industrial products


Construction

Real estate

Education

Financial services


PROUD TO BEONE OF CANADA’S

BESTMANAGEDCOMPANIESSUPPORTING CREATORS SINCE 1909

#WeAreAllCreators

TELESAT, A ONCE-STODGY PSEUDO-GOVERNMENTOUTPOST, IS IN A RACE TO DELIVER THE FASTEST SATELLITE INTERNETTO CUSTOMERS AROUND THE WORLD. BUT IT’S GOING UP AGAINST TWOOF THE RICHEST (AND MOST UNPREDICTABLE) MEN ON THE PLANET

BY JASONKIRBY

PHOTOGRAPH BY NATHAN CYPRYS

Os sunturest veliqui tet fugit, aut reperum ide optaturi autate dendis verrupta dolo tempori re pratempero ipsapienirat aut occusti neceria non culpa cuscim vendign isquatus,cus et as dolorporepel eum que nonsed qui verioremquo queet utectecum et etus, sintem. Tium alique nimin nonet autfaceati quatem eaquam rere preniam accusamusa que ventmoluptur? Apellorem. Nam aut laut aut auta disque conseditatenecestio beatem assequi stianimus sinvelignis enimiliminctem aligni dolut eturiti aepres est vellorrumet hiliaestiisqui bea dolo ditatiataque lis voluptur sum fugit fugitatium,sequi officit qui vid et ut ex et il in cuptur moluptatur arciasvoluptiae volore se pa net pellacculpa ium quae pra idist,quas dolum aut ium fuga. Tia dolectiora quatatem que a videiusa vendis demporeptate volenihillab is eum quas moditasesed maximus dolendia comniendel isquas eiciundi te qua-tur aut mi, illenda nimusae si duntium ni ducimosae odip-sandam eati autem quidelest evererore vollis andant labo.Istrum qui unt.

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Dean Wells has the job of tellingNunavut government employees the precise dateand time they’ll be hurled back into the telecom-munications dark ages. Internet connectivity forthe territory’s government, and most of its econ-omy, for that matter, is beamed via a single geosta-tionary satellite locked in place 36,000 kilometresabove the Earth, and over the course of severaldays twice a year, the angle of the sun overwhelmsthe satellite’s signal with thermal energy, shuttingdown communications for up to 12 minutes at atime. “It might not sound like much, but if you’retrying to make a phone call or send a file, or even ifyou’re standing in line at the grocery store to payfor your stuff, well, you just can’t,” says Wells, thegovernment’s chief information officer.

It gets worse. While that satellite, Telstar 19 Van-tage, launched by Ottawa-based Telesat in 2018,brought moderately faster internet speeds than anearlier one did, it suffers from high latency, or lagtime, and its limited capacity means the govern-ment’s internet needs are six times greater thanthe satellite can provide. The solution, for this cor-ner of the world’s ninth-largest economy, is inter-net rationing. High-priority files get transmittedduring the day, but many other documents mustbe cached and sent overnight, when satellite usageis lighter. And never mind that getting a video callto work properly in Nunavut is a minor miracle. (Itdidn’t when I spoke with Wells in April.)

Yet, for a man who spends his life triaging frag-ile networks, Wells is bursting with excitement.A revolution is unfolding in the skies above him,with companies competing to launch tens of thou-sands of new satellites that will orbit far closerto the Earth’s surface and be capable of provid-ing blazingly fast broadband internet to the mostremote edges of the planet. “Nunavut,” says Wells,“will never be the same.”

Universal high-speed connectivity is the promise at thecore of the new multibillion-dollar space race that’s pit-ting two of the richest, most powerful rocket jockeys on theplanet, Elon Musk (net worth: US$250 billion) and Jeff Bezos(net worth: US$148 billion), against each other.

Oh, and Dan Goldberg (net worth: considerably less).Since 2006, Goldberg has been the CEO of Telesat, the

world’s fourth-largest operator of fixed-position satellites.A few years ago, faced with the reality that itsexisting fleet of lumbering, high-orbit geosta-tionary satellites weren’t up to the high-speed

internet task, Goldberg announced plans to leap into theworld of low-Earth-orbit (LEO) communications satellites,which whiz around the planet multiple times a day but at analtitude of 2,000 kilometres or less, allowing them to offerspeedy and reliable internet on par with fibre. And so Light-speed was born, a $6.5-billion constellation of 298 initialsatellites aimed at serving enterprise customers like govern-ments, telecoms, and companies in the marine and airlineindustries.

If ever there was a moment for the impossible dream ofclosing the digital divide that’s left one-third of the world’spopulation without online access—not to mention the vastswaths of rural Canada plagued by turtle-like downloadspeeds—this is it. Amid the work-from-home revolution, the


Nunavut’s chiefinformation officer,Dean Wells

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Internet of Things and the growing metaverse, demand forfast, remote internet that can’t feasibly be served by land-based fibre networks is exploding. By Telesat’s own esti-mate, the total addressable market for LEO satellites will hitUS$430 billion in 2025, and the company believes it can cap-ture 1% of that market. Even that sliver would imply revenueof US$4.3 billion for a company that posted sales of $760 mil-lion last year. “We’re spending a ton of money to do this, andit will be transformative for Canada, for the world and for thecompany as well,” says Goldberg, who notes the company hasso far prepaid more than US$100 million to secure launchesfor its satellites.

The only problem is, Telesat hasn’t managed to build orlaunch a single commercial Lightspeed satellite. Its primecontractor for the project, France’s Thales Alenia Space, hasbeen hit by the same supply chain delays for simple elec-tronic components that have bedevilled car and home appli-ance buyers over the past year, and Telesat has had to pushback the date for Lightspeed’s commercial rollout to at least2026. The company was also expected to confirm during therelease of its first-quarter results in early May (after this mag-azine went to print) that in the face of inflationary pressuresit will “descope” the initial size of its constellation from 298to 188. Nor had Telesat finalized financing for the ambitiousproject, even though the federal, Ontario and Quebec gov-ernments have committed $2.6 billion to the project. SinceTelesat’s shares started to trade on Nasdaq and the TSX lastNovember, their value has plunged nearly 70%.

Add it all up and Telesat is simultaneously faced with a gal-axy of opportunities for its LEO satellites, and a world of hurtto get there. Nothing less than the future of the company istethered to Goldberg getting the Lightspeed rollout right.

Like a cat with a bell on, you can hear Goldbergcoming before you see him. Thud, rattle, drag.In March, while out for a run with a group offriends, Goldberg’s right foot came down hard

on a patch of black ice as he turned his body. He heard thecrack even before his brain comprehended what had hap-pened to his shattered ankle, which broke in three places.Since then, he’s been on crutches (though he has since shedthe plastic brace on his foot as he undergoes physiotherapy).

As if trying to do rocket science amid a pandemic wasn’talready hard enough.

Goldberg, a trim 57-year-old with an easy smile, isn’t actu-ally a rocket scientist. He’s a Harvard-trained lawyer (one ofhis classmates was Barack Obama), but Goldberg has spentnearly his entire career around satellite companies in Europeand North America, first as in-house counsel at a companycalled PanAmSat and then at Netherlands-based NetSkies,where he rose to become chief operating officer. After thatcompany was sold, he decided to move his family back acrossthe pond. Goldberg was headhunted to join Telesat, a for-mer Crown corporation then owned by Bell Canada, wherehe was tasked with leading the sale of the company. In 2007,Canada’s Public Sector Pension Investment Board and U.S.-based Loral Space & Communications teamed up to buy thecompany for $3.3 billion. (Telesat’s stock market listing lastNovember followed its merger with Loral.)

It was during an airline flight in 2015, as he grappled withhow to keep Telesat relevant in the high-speed digital age, that


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he pulled out a cocktail napkin and started jottingdown ideas for what would eventually becomeLightspeed. Earlier that year Musk had revealedhis low-Earth-orbit plans for Starlink, a “giantglobal internet service provider” that would oper-ate within his SpaceX rocket business. Telesat’sexisting geostationary satellites, of which thereare now 13, take about 800 milliseconds for signalsto travel back and forth to Earth. With LEOs, thatwould be cut to well less than 50 milliseconds. Butthe new venture would be expensive to build andcarry unforeseeable execution risks. In the end,the decision came down to what the company’stelecom, commercial and government customerswere clear they wanted, says Goldberg: “A better,faster, more affordable, more resilient solution.”Only LEO satellites could offer that.

Today, the industry is centred on four main com-panies. In addition to Musk’s Starlink and Telesat,U.K.-based OneWeb has so far launched 422 satel-lites as part of its planned 648-satellite constella-tion, while Amazon’s Project Kuiper envisions anLEO constellation of more than 3,200 satellites.

Starlink, by far, is the most well-known of thebunch. That’s not a surprise when you have ashowman like Musk as your founder. Starlink isalso riding a wave of praise in the wake of Rus-sia’s invasion of Ukraine after it worked with theU.S. government to send thousands of satelliteinternet kits to the war-torn country, allowing res-idents there to stay connected after Russia shutdown other forms of communications.

But Starlink’s high profile also stems from thesimple fact it’s already put so many satellites inspace. At last count, Starlink has launched 2,400LEO satellites out of a planned 40,000. So far thisyear, it’s successfully launched nine rockets filledwith 448 satellites. In March, the company said ithad signed up 250,000 customers in 25 countries.

Telesat’s planned satellite count may seemteeny by comparison to Starlink’s, but that’s bydesign. For one thing, the Lightspeed satelliteswill orbit at higher altitudes—most will circle theEarth at 1,000 kilometres, versus 550 for Starlink.That allows fewer satellites to cover a wider areaon the ground, but not so high that it creates sig-nal delays. Telesat’s satellites will also be inter-connected with one another through optical laserlinks, creating a mesh capable of beaming capac-ity to areas where it’s needed most. A 2021 paperby researchers at the Massachusetts Institute ofTechnology analyzing the four main LEO con-tenders estimated Telesat’s satellite utilizationrate will be 73.4% once the initial web of satellitesis fully deployed, compared to 33% for Starlink.

Goldberg, who met with Musk and SpaceX pres-ident Gwynne Shotwell three years ago to discusstheir respective LEO plans, has heard the Starlinkcomparisons many, many times before. WhileStarlink has recently begun to expand its offeringinto the enterprise sector Telesat plans to focuson, including deals to provide satellite internet to

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some airlines, Goldberg still sees plenty of roomfor both players. “We don’t delude ourselves.SpaceX has been a transformative company, butto be clear, they can be fully successful with theirrocket and Starlink business, and Amazon can besuccessful with their Kuiper business, and we canbe fully successful with Lightspeed because noone is going to dominate and own this entire mar-ket,” he says. “If we were saying we could get 50%of this market, people would be right to questionit. But we feel pretty good about getting 1% or 2%.”

It’s also not a stretch to say the popular viewwithin Telesat is that Starlink’s approach of throw-ing tens of thousands of essentially disposable sat-ellites into space (their shelf life is just five years,versus 10 for Lightspeed satellites) is madness.The company’s executives will never come outand say this, but it’s interwoven in how they talkabout their own project. “We’ve built a constella-tion that’s optimized for enterprise users,” saysGoldberg. “It’s not a best-efforts kind of broad-band connectivity. It’s committed informationrates. It’s providing service at a 99.99% availabil-ity standard. It’s what enterprise and governmentusers demand.”

Dave Wendling, Telesat’s chief technical officer,puts it more succinctly: “Our spacecraft are notthrowaways. They’re big, capable, leading-edgetechnology designed for graceful degradation.Because we can’t afford these things to be fallingout of the sky.”

Telesat’s potential customers are awaiting itsentrance into the market. “There’s an anticipat-ing in the industry that Telesat has the technical

potential to leapfrog some of the others, so we’re anxiouslywaiting for that,” says Rick Hodgkinson, owner and CEO ofGalaxy Broadband Communications Inc., which providessatellite communications services to remote industrial cus-tomers like mines, oil rigs and large construction projects—many of them operating above the 57th parallel, which runsjust north of Fort McMurray, Alta. At the moment, Hodg-kinson is working with OneWeb to test its satellite internetsystem and has roughly a dozen terminals at various sites,including a construction site in Northern Ontario that hadbeen relying on geostationary satellites for connectivity. Hesays he expects to roll out a full commercial launch this June.

But Hodgkinson says OneWeb doesn’t have enough capac-ity in its LEO constellation to meet the needs of his custom-ers. What draws him to Telesat is its ability to beam capacityaround its web of satellites to where it’s needed.

As for Starlink, Hodgkinson says its system design andfocus on the consumer market doesn’t make it suitable forlarge commercial operations. “I think of it this way: If you’re acontractor building homes and you need a vehicle, you’re notgoing to buy a Toyota Prius,” he says. “It’s capable of goingonto job sites, but it can’t haul anything there.”

That may be the case, but not every enterprise customerwill be willing to wait for Telesat to finally enter the race.“I like the Telesat approach of making satellites that aremore robust and capable, but the problem for them laggingbehind is that if Starlink gets operational first, then Starlinkcan win enterprise customers purely by being the only oneavailable,” says Dallas Kasaboski, a consultant with North-ern Sky Research in Strasbourg, France. While Telesat cantry to convert those customers over to Lightspeed once theconstellation is up and running, that’s a slower and costlierprospect. “It’s a very difficult proposition to be the best butalso be last.”


Telesat’s CEO, Dan Goldberg

hile many companies today are just starting torecognize the importance of diversity and inclusion

in their ranks, it has been a reality at Montreal-based LCIEducation for 60 years.

“We are very progressive.We live diversity and inclusion,”says Claude Marchand, LCI Education’s chief executiveofficer, pointing to the 2,000 employees working at its 23higher educational institutions in 13 countries worldwide.

It’s not just the staff and 20,000-plus student populationglobally that make LCI Education diverse. Mr. Marchand saysmore than 50 per cent of its board members and employeesare diverse in terms of gender, race and sexual orientation.

He believes this mix of people and backgrounds is whathelps to make LCI Education an educational pioneer inindustries such as fashion, hospitality and tourism, businessand more recently gaming.

“It drives results because of the collision of ideas,” saysMr. Marchand, who has been head of the family businesssince 2014, after previous roles in marketing and as a vice-president.

LCI Education’sdiversity and innovationhelps educate studentsand workers worldwide LCI Education has a long history of innovation, tracing its

origins back to LaSalle College in Montreal, founded in 1959.At that time, most educational institutions were public orcreated by religious institutions.

Mr. Marchand’s father and a business partner tookover the company in the 1980s and charted its path intointernational markets by opening two campuses in Morocco.Since then, LCI Education has grown rapidly through bothacquisitions and opening new campuses worldwide. It hastwo institutions in Canada: LaSalle College in Montreal andLaSalle CollegeVancouver.

Mr. Marchand and his two brothers bought the businessfrom their retiring father in 2020, just before the pandemic,with financial support from Caisse de dépôt et placement duQuébec.

The pandemic was tough for LCI Education at first,given the unknowns. Still, Mr. Marchand says the companydecided to invest in its operations, particularly its e-learningplatform that was already in place for about two decades inQuebec.

“COVID allowed us to accelerate our transformation as anorganization,” he says.

LCI Education’s focus today is to expand both its physicaland digital presence, which includes building new campusesinVancouver and Barcelona and expanding its e-learningplatform.

“By 2024, the way the general public will look at us willbe completely transformed,” he says. “Physically, they willsee those two magnificent new buildings in Barcelona andVancouver that will be very tangible. At the same time, ourdigital experience will also reach new heights.”

LCI Education also provides a solution to the ongoingtalent crisis, Mr. Marchand says, by providing people with theeducation and skills needed to fill the huge job gaps acrossseveral industries.

“Given our presence in 13 international markets and ourexpertise in e-learning, we are in a position to not only teachkids that will end up in business, but also support businessesdirectly by helping to upskill their workforce,” he says.

Mr. Marchand says students and businesses turn to LCIEducation for its innovative programs and engaged andexpert staff who go out of their way to help students excel.He says employees and students are also engaged in thecommunity where they work and learn.

“I’ve always been very proud of our colleagues and ourorganization’s impact on society worldwide.”


Renderings of newLCI Barcelona andLaSalle CollegeVancouver buildings,currently underconstruction.

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You don’t have to be in Nunavut toendure the grind of sluggish inter-net in Canada or to see the poten-tial opportunity for satellite inter-

net. You could, for instance, drive an hour and ahalf southwest of Toronto, the fourth-largest cityin North America, to a country road in NorfolkCounty (my old stomping grounds). A little southof one of the hamlets there, at a spot where a logfrom the wagon-era corduroy road occasionallybreaks through the pavement, is an invisible linewhere the latest rural broadband initiative is setto end. While the 200 residents in the hamlet arelikely to see download speeds that meet the Cana-dian Radio-Television and TelecommunicationsCommission’s 50/10 target (50 Mbps download,10 Mbps upload), the scattered farms to the southwill be left with speeds in the range of one to threeMbps down.

According to the CRTC, only about 45% of ruralhouseholds in Canada can obtain its target down-load speed. That figure falls to 35% for people liv-ing on First Nations reserves.

For rural development researchers like HelenHambly at the University of Guelph, the endlesspromises about faster rural broadband make onething clear: The status quo is failing. “At a timewhen you’ve got rising food prices and labourshortages on farms, you have this agriculturedigital revolution happening without the under-lying connectivity to support it,” she says, point-ing to technologies like sensors and drones thathelp improve crop yields. “We’ve been workingon these issues for, my goodness, 12 years now,and sometimes I have a hard time sustaining myenergy to get people to buy into why we needmore effort in this area.”

While Telesat will not be serving rural internetusers directly, it does plan to work with telecomsto provide what’s known as backhaul connectiv-ity to communities where fibre isn’t an affordableoption. It turns out there are a lot of them.

At Telesat, it’s Manik Vinnakota’s job to map outthe commercial opportunities for Lightspeed. Or

in other words, to figure out how the massive project will payfor itself. That means compiling and analyzing millions ofdata points on things like commercial airline traffic routes,cruise and merchant ship traffic, urban-rural populationdivides and distances to local highways—an indicator of theease with which an area can eventually be served by fibreoptics on the ground.

When it came to Canada, Vinnakota used federal data thatdivides the entire Canadian landmass into a geospatial gridof 516,322 individual hexagons, with each 25-square-kilome-tre hexagon including sundry details about the populationthat lives there, what broadband speeds are available to them,and the distance to the closest land-based fibre optic cable.Their research identified roughly 1,200 rural communitieswhere, over a 10-year time horizon, it would be more eco-nomical to connect them to high-speed through Lightspeedversus the cost of laying thousands of kilometres of new fibreoptic cable. “That was a big light bulb that went off for us,”Vinnakota says. “It proved our initial numbers that showedwe have a clear and viable business case, because the lowest-cost option should win.”

The question for Guelph’s Hambly then comes back towhen Telesat will get its satellites to space, especially sincethe federal government committed nearly $600 million tothe company’s Lightspeed project in 2020, and the launchdate has now been pushed back. “I have no problem withthis investment, but the folks who are not connected to high-speed internet needed this yesterday,” says Hambly.

In the meantime, rural customers are embracing Starlink,despite its high costs. (In March, Starlink’s price tag got evensteeper due to what it called “excessive levels of inflation”—for new orders, its internet unit rose to $759 from $649, whilemonthly fees also rose from $129 to $140.) It’s a phenomenonHambly is also tracking via customer reviews posted on theReddit page for Starlink Canada. She recently launched a dataanalysis project to scrape comments from the 1,100-membercommunity to understand to what extent the service is clos-ing the high-speed gap.

It certainly worked for James Lindsay, a teacher and firechief in Lynn Lake, a community of about 500 people innorthern Manitoba. As soon as Starlink announced it wouldbe available, Lindsay put his name on the waiting list, hav-ing endured 0.25 Mbps download speeds through Bell MTS’s“allegedly high-speed DSL,” he says.


Y

9,900+ TONNES TOTAL MASS OF ALL SPACE OBJECTS IN EARTH’S ORBIT

42,000

STARLINK ONEWEB

648

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1,600 648

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PROJECTKUIPER

3,236

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and SpaceJeff Bezos’s Amazon

Elon Musk’s SpaceX

SATELLITES LAUNCHEDINTO EARTH’S ORBIT

SINCE 1957

6,200 12,980

NUMBER OF LEO SATELLITES PLANNED, BY COMPANY NUMBER OFROCKET LAUNCHES

SINCE 1957*

s P3Veterinary Partners welcomes more practicesinto its veterinary hospital network across Canada, the

company’s founders stay committed to their three P’s: Pets,People and Practice.

The Oakville, Ont.-based company has developed fromits start in 2015 to include 49 veterinary practices andanticipates its group will grow beyond 100 hospitals in thenear future.

“As we build our network, we are committed to retainingour humble beginnings and that feeling that we’re here tohelp,” says Nicole Judge, P3’s chief medical officer.

Dr. Judge co-founded the company with chief executiveofficer Bruce Campbell, a CPA who has more than twodecades of experience working with business owners andleaders.

The duo had a vision to connect the resources andcapabilities of a large company with the personality andflexibility of an independently owned hospital.Their vision

A focus on‘Pets, People andPractice’ drives growthfor P3 VeterinaryPartners

was to build a network of partner veterinary hospitals andwork with their clinical colleagues to provide easy accessto best-in-class mentorship and continuing educationopportunities, management and human resources support,and assistance with hospital administration.They want P3 tobe the best place to work in veterinary medicine.

Many of P3’s partners are later-career veterinarians whocare about their teams and community legacies.Whetherthese doctors retain an ownership interest in their practicesor not, they want a thoughtful, capable partner that will carefor and build on their life’s work.

Other partners are mid-career veterinarians who areinterested in ownership but want an experienced partner onthe management side to enable the work-life balance that somany professionals are seeking. Many are associate doctors,veterinary technicians and hospital support team memberswho are simply looking for a fantastic place to belong, workand thrive.

Transition and growth are team efforts.The co-founderspoint to Grey Bruce Pet Hospital in Owen Sound, Ont. asone example.The practice moved to a new, state-of-the-art 6,000-square-foot facility this spring. Former owners,Deborah Boyd and David Gomez have been joined by thehospital’s new partner and medical director, Aaryn Clark.Together, these doctors are proudly guiding the team andpractice forward.

Mr. Campbell says the pandemic has put significantpressure on the veterinary industry.

“COVID has had people rethinking their priorities,” hesays.

Many hospital owners are reaching out to P3 looking for apartner to help them realize their goals.

“Now that P3 is established, it means veterinariansthinking about joining our group can talk with those whoalready have,” Mr. Campbell says.

“It’s a bit of that perfect storm,” Dr. Judge adds, notingthat many hospital owners are simply exhausted and “justwant someone to come in and help take the practice to thenext level and allow them to refocus on medicine.”

Doctors who partner with P3 get way more than justhelp with payroll, scheduling, inventory management andother administrative functions: P3 offers tailored continuingeducation, P3’s in-house mentorship program, and careeradvancement opportunities, Dr. Judge adds.

“It’s not just an education piece,” she says. “It’s also anopportunity for our veterinarians to get to know each otherand build relationships, both with the medical advisory boardand also with each other.”


Drs. Debbie Boyd,David Gomez, andAaryn Clark, togetherwith the entire GreyBruce Pet Hospitalteam, on moving dayinto their new facilityin Owen Sound,Ont. Grey Bruce PetHospital was the firsthospital to join P3Veterinary Partnersin 2016.

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On March 18, when Lindsay got his hands onhis Dishy McFlatface—the nickname given byStarlink’s engineers to its internet terminal—heimmediately set it up and tested it out. The resultswere staggering: 199 Mbps down, 13 Mbps up. Atlast count, at least 45 people in Lynn Lake and thenearby Marcel Colomb First Nation—the “rag-gedy edge” of Starlink’s current service area, asLindsay puts it—have become customers. “The21st century is finally going to arrive in LynnLake,” he says.

Using low-Earth satellites to pro-vide broadband isn’t a new idea.In the 1990s, several companies—including Bill Gates–backed Telede-

sic—vowed to create “internet in the sky,” but allsaw their plans go down in flames. In 2021, Muskacknowledged the industry’s poor track record ina tweet: “Every new satellite constellation in his-tory has gone bankrupt. We hope to be the firstthat does not.”

A lot has changed since then. The technologybehind satellites has improved dramatically, whilethe cost to build and launch them had been fallingsteadily, at least until the current wave of supply-chain disruptions and soaring energy costs beganto bite. Most of all, the world’s appetite for high-speed broadband has only grown more voracious.In the early 1990s, global internet traffic amountedto 0.0001 exabytes a month, according to network-ing giant Cisco. (An exabyte is one billion giga-bytes.) This year, IP traffic is forecast to hit 400exabytes a month. Next stop: the zettabyte era.

That’s not to say the industry isn’t starting to lookcrowded, sometimes to bizarre degrees. This pastOctober, Rwanda filed a request with the UnitedNations’ International Telecommunication Union(ITU) to put nearly 330,000 LEO satellites in spaceas part of that country’s quest to become the hubof Africa’s space industry. A month later, anotherCanadian startup, Toronto-based Kepler Commu-nications, leapt into the fray with its own requestto the ITU that would see it develop a megaconstel-

lation of 114,852 satellites, though the company says it plans tolaunch just 200 itself to create an “internet in space.” The bal-ance would come from other space-industry customers whowould affix Kepler’s tech to their own satellites to tap into itsspace-based network. In March, Germany’s Rivada Space Net-works proposed a 600-satellite constellation. Another Cana-dian company, Skytrac Systems of Kelowna, B.C., followed amonth later with plans for a 700-satellite network of its own.

It’s not clear if any of those projects will receive regula-tory approval and go ahead, but even if they don’t, space isfilling up. Since 2011, the number of satellites has jumped to8,600 from around 1,000. Telesat mission control, housed in atinted-glass room in an office building overlooking Ottawa’sElgin St., contains rows of computer terminals and monitors.One large screen in particular jumps out. It displays a feedof every satellite and object currently stationed in space ororbiting the Earth—a mass of tiny dots that combine to forma goopy mush around the planet.

That has scientists and astronomers alarmed. In a paper lastmonth for the journal Nature Astronomy, a group of scientistswarned that by 2030, the number of satellites in low-Earthorbit could blow past 100,000 and “significantly alter ourwhole perception of the night sky in the long term, appearingas ‘fake stars’ [and] rival the number of visible real stars.”

Even so, the LEO space race is showing no signs of slowing.

Space is a brutal, unforgiving place to do busi-ness. This past February, Starlink lost 40 sat-ellites a day after launch when a geomagneticstorm caused them to fall from orbit and burn

up. As Telesat notes in its prospectus about the dangersinherent in its industry, “these risks include in-orbit equip-ment failures, malfunctions and other kinds of anomalies[such as] circuit failures, transponder failures, solar arrayfailures, telemetry subsystem failures, battery cell and otherpower system failures, satellite control system failures andpropulsion system failures.” If that weren’t enough, the com-pany continued, “magnetic, electrostatic or solar storms,space debris, satellite conjunctions [and] micrometeoroids”can take out a satellite at any moment.

But if all that sounds bad, it’s nothing compared to a


U

The inner workings of Telesat’s antenna in Hanover, Ont., thatcommunicates with the company’s LEO 1 demonstration satellite

S

he Shah Canada Group of Companies creates successby embracing the future while honouring the past.

The family’s entrepreneurial roots trace back to Kenya,where the family ran clothing and textile companies in EastAfrica.With the intention to start a textile business in Canada,they soon realized that there was a far greater opportunityto supply ethnic foods to the growing immigrant population.Hence, in 1974, Shashi Shah started ShahTrading Co. Ltd.and along with his brothers, built it into one of Canada’s mostsuccessful importing and distribution businesses.

In 2006, backed by their father Shashi, brothers Sujay andAjay Shah launched their own entrepreneurial initiative:TheShah Canada Group of Companies.

“Growing up in the family business, my brothers and I

Shah Canada’s strongfoundation of familybusiness success

inherited this amazing knowledge of importing and tradingand we capitalized on it by incorporating food science andtechnology to create value-added and manufacturing focusedorganizations. One of these was Kii Naturals, a manufacturerof artisan crackers. In just seven years, we built it to 120employees, shipping product to over 25 countries and in 2017,sold the business to a U.S. private equity firm,” says SujayKumar Shah, president and chief executive officer of ShahCanada, who runs the group along with his brother RajayShah, vice-president.

Today, Shah Canada’s portfolio of companies – whichincludes Shashi Foods and Smile Natural Foods – employ acomplex trading strategy that sources raw materials frommore than 40 countries around the world.

Shashi Foods is North America’s leading manufacturerfor globally procured and locally curated spices, herbs, andseasonings. Shashi’s exciting portfolio of products are usedby some of the most recognizable brands in retail, packagedfood, and food service industries in North America andbeyond.

Smile Natural Foods is a private-label producer of organicand gluten-free muesli, granola and nutrient-dense breakfastcereals for major supermarket chains across Canada and theU.S.

The Shah Canada portfolio also includes Clarius, whichinvests in privately held companies in and beyond the foodindustry, and Jay Capital, a real estate portfolio company withindustrial and commercial holdings.

“We run multiple businesses,” Sujay says. “To grow andmanage them successfully over the last couple of years,we have had to continuously adapt to a rapidly changingenvironment. By utilizing a strong foundation and applyingingenuity, know-how and entrepreneurial spirit, the companyhas maintained its status as a Platinum Club winner ofCanada’s Best Managed Companies over the last decade.”

Over the last two years, Shah Canada has injected moreautomation and software integration into its business,allowing it to stay competitive in the face of rising costsand increased competition.The company also took theopportunity to groom a group of senior directors, managersand officers who will help apply the family’s businessacumen and generational knowledge to increasingly complexand ever-changing global markets.

“Using modern food science and technology to developinnovation and generate growth throughout global markets,is one of this generation’s contributions to the ongoing legacyof the family business,” Sujay says.

“The purpose of Shah Canada is to take everything we’velearned from our past generations, combined with theknowledge we’ve created, and pass all of that on to the nextgeneration to continue our legacy.”


Left to right:Rajay Shah,vice-president,Sujay Kumar Shah,president and chiefexecutive officer, andthe late Ajay Shah.

T

gummed-up supply chain back on Earth.In October, Goldberg was at his cottage recov-

ering from COVID-19 when he got a call from thepresident of Thales Alenia’s space division, whichhas the contract to build the LEO constellation. Amonth earlier, Goldberg had been in Paris, his firsttrans-atlantic trip since the start of the pandemic,and had received hints suppliers were strugglingto find parts. The phone call confirmed it: Telesatwould have to push back Lightspeed’s launch date.“That was a kick in the teeth,” says Goldberg.

The delays don’t necessarily involve complexparts; instead, they’re the general building blocksof all electronic equipment: resistors, diodes andintegrated circuits. Without them, the satellitescan’t be completed.

In addition to announcing the delay of Light-speed’s launch, Telesat is considering severalsteps to minimize further disruption, includingswitching some subcontractors, swapping com-ponents and ordering parts far earlier than it nor-mally would.

Soaring inflation in the cost of parts and labouralso presented Telesat with an uncomfortabledecision—it would either have to raise moremoney or downsize its initial ambitions. As itstood in early May, Goldberg was still in talkswith Export Development Canada and Bpifrance,the two export creditagencies the companyis relying on to provideroughly 40% of the project’s $6.5 billion in capitalfunding. If either of those two agencies don’t comethrough, Telesat might have to find other ways tofinance the project as the cost of bor-rowing gets much steeper. (Goldbergsays he’s cautiously optimistic, but “ifthat doesn’t come to pass, we’ll cross that bridgewhen we get there.”)

That leaves the option of building a lighterLightspeed. Wendling, Telesat’s chief technicalofficer, says even if the initial rollout has 188 sat-ellites instead of 298, “the constellation will stillprovide many terabits per second of capacity, waymore than is out there right now.” The long-termgoal remains to expand Lightspeed to around 1,670satellites, he says. It’ll just take longer to get there.

Investors are losing patience. While the recentrout has sunk many tech companies’ stock, Tele-sat’s has been in decline since November. As ofearly May, it traded for $15.50 on the TSX, downfrom $45 six months ago.

One problem, analysts say, is the company hasn’tdone a great job developing relationships withequity investors. Its stock market listing didn’tcome with the issuance of any new shares, so theBay and Wall Street marketing machines that nor-mally accompany an IPO have been absent.

At the same time, Goldberg has had to fieldrepeated calls from Telesat bond investors whosedebt is tied to declining revenue from the com-pany’s legacy satellites. His exasperation came

through on a recent conference call when one bond analystkept describing spending on Lightspeed as a “drag.” WhenTelesat treasurer Michael Bolitho echoed the analyst’s word-ing, Goldberg jumped in. “Let’s not do this drag thing,” hesaid. “We are investing. We’ve spent our money pretty care-fully. We don’t invest it, we hope, in a dumb way.” At anotherpoint in the call, Goldberg summed up his message to bondinvestors: “What we’re trying to say is, like, chill.”

The tensions reflect a half-century-old company that’s try-ing to transform itself in an industry now dominated by theworld’s most disruptive personality: Elon Musk. “Elon is avery promotional person, and that’s part of the success of hiscompanies, and that doesn’t work for everyone,” says Wal-ter Piecyk, an analyst at New York–based LightShed Part-ners who covers Telesat. “But sometimes companies focustoo much on making sure they have all their ducks lined upbefore they talk about what they’re doing, and in my opinionthat’s the approach of a company that’s been talking to bondinvestors for the last decade.”

For starters, Piecyk hopes Telesat will spend more time atinvestor conferences and on the business-TV circuit. “Look,are you going to launch this thing or not? And if you are goingto launch it,” he says, “you need to get out and talk about thetarget markets and what you’re going to do to address them.”

For his part, Goldberg says Telesat has signed up to do more


investor conferences this year. But ultimately he ascribes toa “show, don’t tell” philosophy. “Actions speak louder thanwords, and I’m a big believer that folks need to see concretemilestones,” he says. “Investors need to see us close ourfinancing, launch satellites, announce customer contracts,build a contractual backlog, and I’m very comfortable we candemonstrate that.”

In the meantime, in February it signed a deal with a con-tractor to build 30 landing stations worldwide that will linkthe Lightspeed constellation to terrestrial networks. It’s alsoletting potential customers see Lightspeed’s capability upclose with LEO 1, a demonstration satellite launched in 2018.(A second demo craft is due to be launched later this year.)

Nunavut’s Dean Wells has already taken LEO 1 for a spinand was floored by the results. He believes the territory willultimately sign contracts with several LEO satellite opera-tors, with Telesat as one possibility. His team has already runfibre optic cables to government buildings in all 25 commu-nities in the territory. Plans are also underway to install fibrelinking Iqaluit to a destination farther south. Combine all thatwith a world that has embraced the remote delivery of vitalservices like health care and education, and the pieces are inplace for life in Nunavut to be fundamentally transformed.

“You couldn’t have ordered it any better,” says Wells. “Thestars are aligning.”

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email [email protected]


BY SEAN SILCOFF PHOTOGRAPHS BY LAURENCE PHILOMENE

Katherine Homuth’s unrippable pantyhose are a hit, but they mightbe too pricey for average consumers.

How cheap do they have to get before they take over the mass market?


Homuth is founder and CEO of Sheertex HoldingsCorp., which is trying to break a lot of things withits flagship product: unbreakable sheer pantyhose.They’re not made from nylon, but rather the sametough polymer used in bulletproof vests and climbinggear. Sheertex’s revenues were US$5.6 million in 2019,US$11.8 million in 2020 and US$26.8 million in 2021.The forecast for 2022 is to more than double sales again.

So what’s breaking right now? “The way we operatethis part of the warehouse will break this summer,” saysvice-president of operations Gordon Hensley during avisit to Sheertex’s headquarters in Montreal’s Saint-Michel neighborhood. He’s pointing at a second-floorspace stacked with boxes of product, ready to ship. It’s

as full as it was during the peak season in October.“The space for raw materials is currently break-

ing,” chimes in chief operating officer Zak Homuth,the CEO’s husband, adding: “Knitting is going to breaksoon.” The company has 96 machines on order to bol-ster the 116 already in operation one floor below. The60-person head-office part of the building is full, andSheertex is hiring, “so we’ve currently broken that,”says Katherine. The studio near reception—where atthis very moment a model in the company’s signaturesheer black tights is posing for photos that will likelyend up in one of the company’s ubiquitous Instagramads—is booked solid. The parking situation, adds Zak,“is painful.” He needs to secure another multipurposefacility by July, but vacancy rates are tight. “And thosearen’t even the decisions we’re worried about,” saysKatherine. The trio giggles with a resigned “you-just-have-to-laugh-at-it” vibe.

It’s been five years since Katherine Homuth, then26, decided to manufacture sheer tights that didn’trun. She thought it would be straightforward: Find atough yarn, hire an overseas manufacturer to makethe things, then ship them directly to customers, likeany e-commerce business. She ultimately decided tomake them herself, which required figuring out howto do something groundbreaking with material thathadn’t been used in pantyhose, persuade financiers toback an upstart with no textile experience in a stagnantcategory and, of course, win over customers. “It’s beena brutal fight the whole way,” says Michael Helander,who sits on Sheertex’s board.

But the company has built a loyal fan base with itsrun-proof tights and claims 80% of customers sur-veyed have forsaken other brands since trying theirs.Sheertex also says that more than half the people whobought their tights in 2019 have purchased again.

Sheertex has an impressive roster of financial back-ers, including prominent female angel investorsMichele Romanow and Eva Lau, two cleantech venturefunds, and Canadian fashion icons Joe Mimran andChip Wilson. “We invested in Katherine because sheis technical and has business savvy,” says Wilson, thebillionaire founder of Lululemon Athletica, who putin US$5 million this year. Her product, he says, “willsave women time and money, and it’s in a niche marketSheertex can be best in the world at.”

But the biggest name in Homuth’s corner is Swed-ish retail giant H&M Group. Its Co:Lab investment armled a $101-million financing in April backed by ExportDevelopment Canada, Wilson and existing inves-tors. (H&M’s share was $62.5 million.) For Homuth,who eventually wants to see her product distributedthrough bricks-and-mortar outlets worldwide, theinvestment was validation that she’s on to somethingbig. For H&M, it was a signal to both the fashion andfinancial markets that it’s serious about cutting downon the amount of its fast-fashion apparel that ends upin landfills.

But Homuth still has a lot to prove. The key chal-lenge: scaling up while slashing costs. Sheertex, which

Katherine Homuth once gleaned thisnugget of wisdom from a podcast:Improving a company by 5% a yearcauses everything to break internally.“And when you’re trying to grow likeus—100%-plus every year—you breakeverything all the time,” she says.


originally sold its pantyhose at the high-end price ofUS$99, has managed to wrestle its costs down fromUS$75 a pair in 2019 to between US$15 and US$20now. That allowed it to introduce a US$29 version thisyear—a major step toward broadening its appeal. Butto become a nylon-killer and conquer the US$16-bil-lion sheer hosiery market, she figures she’ll have to getthe unit cost down to five bucks. “Once we hit a pointwhere you can make these for the price of a regularpair of tights,” she says, “there becomes absolutely noreason anyone would ever buy or make anything else.”

Even her most ardent supporters aren’t sure she cando it. A big reason is that material amounts to 70% ofher costs. Sure, she can save on automation, but howmuch more can she squeeze out elsewhere? “Her bigchallenge will be making money,” says Mimran. “At theend of the day, a lot of these companies continue togrow, but they can’t get their economics to work.”

The presentation was not going well. It was Octo-ber 2018, and Homuth was speaking to a room-ful of investors and tech veterans at the CreativeDestruction Lab (CDL), an accelerator programhoused at the University of Toronto’s Rotman

School of Management. Every startup needed at leastone sponsor to support them or they’d be booted out.

In the previous 18 months, Homuth had gotten hertights to near-commercial readiness. She’d raisedUS$190,000 in a Kickstarter campaign, gone throughSilicon Valley accelerator Y Combinator and securedUS$4 million in seed financing. Production was startingin a garage in Bracebridge, Ont. Nonetheless, she says,“everyone in the room thought hosiery was a terriblemistake.” CDL types liked to fund transformational sci-entific breakthroughs, not old-school consumer-prod-uct e-commerce. They thought her raw material wouldbe better used elsewhere, like the space industry.

“There wasn’t much excitement in that room,” saysHelander, a CDL mentor. “Somebody called it a failedconsumer product company before it had even shippedits first product,” since Homuth had temporarily haltednew orders due to quality issues. Nobody put up a handto keep her in CDL past the first session.

It wasn’t the first or last time Homuth would facedoubters. The Mississauga native had sold her e-com-merce startup, ShopLocket, in 2014 and dabbled for afew years looking for her next big thing. One idea wasto launch a consumer product that would solve a realproblem. She remembered her grandmother, afterdealing with yet another run, declaring that someoneneeded to reinvent pantyhose. Homuth had her own“pantyhose graveyard,” a drawer of torn tights. In early2017, she asked a friend in the fashion industry if any-one had ever made indestructible ones. The answerwas no. She decided to explore further.

Pantyhose were originally created in 1953 by EthelGant, the pregnant wife of a North Carolina knitting-factory owner in search of something to attach herstockings to, since girdles were out. But the nylonoriginals that became fashionable in the 1960s were

fragile and frustrating, and remained so. Sales starteddeclining around the same time Sex and the City madebare legs and open-toed shoes popular—from a billionunits in 1995 to 245 million in 2017, the year Homuthstarted poking around. But sheer hosiery still gener-ated US$15.8 billion in global sales that year, accordingto Euromonitor International. Homuth thought it was abig enough market to pursue.

She ordered fibre samples and did a simple strengthtest: wrapping the yarn around her finger and yanking.It had to be thin enough for tights, but “if it snappedcoming off the spool, it probably wouldn’t make inde-structible ones,” she says. Dozens of samples failed.

Undaunted, Homuth looked beyond traditional yarnsto industrial fibres. That’s how she found ultra-high-molecular-weight polyethylene (UHMWPE). Thematerial was thick, white and not stretchy; when shedid the yank test, “it hit the mark of indestructibility Iwas looking for,” she says. “It nearly cut my finger off.”

But it was hard to work with. She shipped some to aChinese hosiery factory to make a sample textile andgot an angry note back: It had broken their machine.She was told never to call again. The sample looked likecheesecloth.

Nonetheless, she showed it to Mimran. “Well, thisis terrible,” he recalls telling Homuth. “I can’t getinvolved in this.” But she worked with a supplier tomake the fibre fine and stretchy enough for hosiery.“You’re still not there,” Mimran told her after seeingthe next prototype. But he admired her tenacity anddecided to invest—even though she knew little aboutmanufacturing, yarn or textile development. Plus, shewas manufacturing at a 2,000-square-foot factory nearLake Muskoka, where she’d just moved. “Imagine howwild that is,” says Mimran, who remembers thinking,You’re putting up a lot of hurdles in front of yourself.

As Homuth refined the product through successiveprototypes, she came to appreciate the material moreand more: It made sheer, lightweight tights that wereantimicrobial, water resistant and cool to the touch.But the polymer was undyeable and could only becoloured when it was made; further dyeing only stuck

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to the other materials woven into the tights.Despite encountering production issues—including

the fact that the yarn jammed the knitting machines,requiring them to be modified—she was determined toproduce them herself. While UHMWPE was off-pat-ent, the process to turn it into hosiery would requirenovel, proprietary processes that would form the basisof Sheertex’s intellectual property. She felt she couldn’ttrust that to a contract manufacturer. (Sheertex has onepatent and has filed for five more covering the uniquefeatures of its products, materials and processes, and itworks hard to maintain trade secrecy around its manu-facturing methods.)

Homuth had accomplished all this only to get a coldreception at CDL. But Helander soon began to havesecond thoughts about not raising his hand on herbehalf. “The roomful of men probably thought this wasa super-niche market and had no concept of what thevalue proposition actually meant to the customer andthe opportunity for disruption,” he says now. (Homuthadds that even women investors were initially hesi-tant.) Helander called CDL staff. Homuth was back in.

Sheertex began shipping tights in December 2018under the brand name Sheerly Genius. Time Maga-

invested in 2020 before leading the big round thisspring. The retailer has set a goal of using recycledand sustainably sourced inputs by 2030. “The fact thatSheertex is clearly and successfully addressing theproblem of durability within a specific product spacealigns perfectly with the wider industry issues we aretackling and actively looking to address ourselves,”says Nanna Andersen, head of H&M Co:Lab. “As we tryto lead the way to a circular business model, more resil-ient products will be an important part of that.” Sheer-tex products are already on sale at H&M’s COS banner,making it a key partner in Sheertex’s global expansion.“We see ourselves as an obvious fit for sustainabilityin terms of taking a disposable product and making itnon-disposable,” Homuth says.

She doesn’t plan to stop with tights: Sheertex isexpanding into other categories, including socks andshapewear, and hopes to license its fabric to other cloth-iers, like Gore-Tex does. “With a person like Katherine,the first innovation is rarely the last, and we believe inher long-run ability to drive change in apparel,” saysLululemon’s Wilson. “She’s a category killer with nocompetition.”

Back in 2019, however, Homuth’s ambition was rub-

M AT E R I A L C O N C E R N

81 LBSClothing chucked out by the average Canadian annually

PORTION OF ALLPLASTICS INCANADIAN LANDFILLSBY MATERIAL(kilotonnes) PACKAGING

(1,524 KT)AUTOMOTIVE

(309 KT)TEXTILES(235 KT)

47% 9% 7%NUMBER OFNEW GARMENTSPRODUCEDANNUALLY

TODAY50 BILLION 100 BILLION+

10%Global CO2 emissions that come from fashion—more than international flightsand shipping combined, according to the UN Environment Programme

bing up against the life she wanted to build in Ontario’scottage country. One of those dreams had to give. Allthe talent, support and infrastructure was in Montreal,Canada’s garment capital. She’d regularly have to bringin mechanics and seamstresses from Montreal, andwould fly there herself to dye the tights and then returnto Muskoka to dry them at a local laundromat. Therewere other logistical headaches: One batch that cost$50,000 to make was ruined when her Montreal consul-tant tried a new finishing process. FedEx lost anothershipment of 1,000-plus units.

“Our first set of challenges were all around, ‘Okay,you’re capping out on warehouse space, and are wereally staying in Muskoka?’” says McCaig. “We all knewwe’d need to leave.”

Homuth learned Gildan Activewear was shutteringoperations at a 115,000-square-foot Montreal plant thatmade Secret pantyhose and offshoring production.

zine hailed them as an invention of the year. By May2019, sales had reached US$250,000 a month. At thefinal CDL session that spring, Eva Lau of Two SmallFish Ventures told the room she’d bought nearly $1,000worth of Sheertex products, loved their durability andhad kicked herself for not investing earlier. “I think thatopened many eyes,” says Lau.

CDL investors lined up to back Sheertex’s nextfinancing, a US$10-million round that closed in Sep-tember 2019. The lead was ArcTern Ventures, a Torontocleantech fund. Sheertex’s durability gave it circular-economy cachet: Every pair sold kept multiple pairsof flimsy nylons out of landfills. “We had been look-ing at opportunities in sustainable fashion,” says Arc-Tern managing partner Murray McCaig. “I don’t thinkSheertex necessarily saw itself as an environmentalcompany, but we certainly did.”

That’s the same rationale for H&M, which first

2000


It was a bit dated but came with knitting and sewingmachines on the cheap. She signed a lease in September2019 and kept on Gildan’s employees. “If I had accessto the kind of information I have now, taking over thisfactory when we did was probably the most illogicalfinancial decision,” she admits. “On a spreadsheet, it

10 MILLION TONNESAmount of clothing North Americans send to landfill each year

Bathtubsfull of water

Cotton T-shirt (itsproduction requires

2,650 litres ofwater)

127

made no sense. Luckily, I had no spreadsheets at thetime. It was like, ‘Yup, looks good. Let’s do it.’”

Sheertex relocated that fall. Toward the end of 2019—pantyhose sales are heaviest in the last quarter—rev-enue topped US$1 million a month for the first time,and Sheertex raised another US$30 million led by U.S.cleantech fund G2 Venture Partners.

Then came the pandemic. The company shut downfor two months; the recent raise and government wagesupports helped. A bigger problem was whether home-bound women would buy pantyhose again. To keep thefactory running, it shifted to making face masks, whichaccounted for 40% of sales in August 2020. Globalpantyhose sales, meanwhile, plummeted by 14% in2020 to 5.7 billion pairs, according to Euromonitor. ButSheertex kept growing, and that’s before a return to“normal” for the category when pantyhose customersreturn to offices en masse.

“There’s this love-hate relationship with how far we’vecome,” says Homuth. “If I’d known how hard it would be,I don’t think I would have done this. But we never wouldhave gotten to where we are. Ignorance allowed us tomake some leaps no one else would have made. I’m stillpretty ignorant as to how hard it’s going to be.”

When his wife leased the Gildan plant in Mon-treal, Zak Homuth was skeptical. He felt theplace was “terrifyingly huge and old andcrappy” and “a boondogglish use of money.”Parts of it should be boarded up, he told Kath-

erine—a critique she says left her “a bit dazed.”That was in fall 2019. The computer engineer and

entrepreneur was living “happily in the forest” at theirLake Muskoka property with their two Great Danes.He’d just left the U.S. software company that hadbought his startup (Upverter, which made a programfor hardware engineers) and was overseeing a homereno. Katherine had told him she was moving to Mon-treal. He didn’t plan to follow.

That wasn’t unusual for the couple, who’d beentogether since 2011. They were both strong-willed peo-ple who’d spent months living in different cities whilebuilding their startups. They could be brutally frankwith each other—Zak has a blunt manner and a gruff,booming voice reminiscent of actor Seth Rogen—butalso supportive. It was Zak who’d encouraged Kath-erine not to shut down Sheertex when poor customerreviews followed its first shipment. They were bothentrepreneurs and knew the drill: Expect the unex-pected and adapt.

So when a worried Katherine called Zak in earlyNovember 2019, he did what she asked: Get on a planeto Montreal ASAP.

In just over two years, she’d turned a simple idea intoa fast-growing business selling a product consumersloved and fashionistas lauded. But it was expensive toscale a manufacturing operation. She needed to raisemore money—soon.

Katherine was heading to New York and asked Zakto “babysit” the factory. She promised to show him the


ropes but was already gone when he arrived. The placewas in chaos. She’d hired 60 people one day in October,but simply hiring a throng of workers wasn’t going tosolve any of her problems, says Katherine. There werewaste issues: 70% of the expensive polymer didn’t sur-vive the pantyhose-making process and was repur-posed into lower-value scrunchies and headbands.There was little management structure. Sheertex had“knowing-what-to-do problems,” Katherine says. Shedidn’t even know her gross margins.

Zak found Katherine’s on-site consultant and madehimself useful. The couple like to joke that ever sincethat day, Zak hasn’t been allowed to leave.

Despite lacking textile experience, Zak was techni-cally savvy and immediately set about fixing problems.He developed detailed instructions for each of the one-time Gildan operators to ensure they didn’t just pushbuttons and produce too much of any particular size,style or colour. He developed software, and mappedout plans to add sensors and tablets to machines thatwould pinpoint every bit of data in the process and rootout inefficiencies. In early 2020, he became chief oper-ating officer.

Since Zak came on board, the factory has reducedwaste—raw material that doesn’t go into pantyhose—to 10%. That has meant dropping nude-coloured tightsfor now, where waste was higher, to focus on sheerblack. Sheertex made 500,000 pairs last year, with plansto triple that in 2022. But its “pilot factory,” as Zak callsCanada’s largest hosiery plant, will likely hit capacitywithin a few years, and plans are afoot to move into avast, purpose-built factory in 2025 with annual capac-ity to make hundreds of millions of pairs.

He has help. At the behest of Sheertex’s board, thecompany last year recruited a “grown-up” veteranoperations leader in Gordon Hensley. He has over-seen lean-operating auto plants for Magna and others,and describes his job as “trying to create flow,” largelythrough automation. Each pair of pantyhose, individu-ally or in a batch, is now touched by humans seven timesthroughout the production process. Hensley’s goal isto cut that to two. Last year, 1% of tights were assem-bled using automation. The goal is 25% this year andeventually 80%.

Sheertex has been installing large gusset line closermachines (GLCs) that, once loaded manually, handlefour tasks previously done by human operators, includ-ing cutting leggings and sewing in gussets (the rein-forced crotch part). The plant is putting three GLCsinto service and plans to install six to nine more in thenext year. Getting GLCs “to play nicely with our mate-rials is still a work in progress,” Zak reports. Hensley ismore optimistic: “We’re very close to having these run-ning the way they’ll always be running going forward,”he says.

Hensley also hopes to automate quality control, nowhandled by five people who eyeball each finished pair.But Sheertex stresses its 98-person manufacturing staffwill grow, not shrink, from present levels.

Automation can only get Sheertex so far, however.Material accounts for 70% of costs. If Homuth wants toreach her US$5-a-pair goal and maintain gross marginsaround 50%, spending has to come down. Zak acknowl-edges that cutting material waste and finding efficien-cies from scale will only go so far.

The answer, Katherine says, is vertical integration:“Our goal is that everything that goes into the productin the next 10 years is something we make ourselvesfrom raw material. We’re dedicating the next few yearsto optimizing our supply chain. Effectively that meansgetting closer to the source. It allows us to cut our costsdirectly.” How will she do that? She won’t say publicly,at least not yet. And she knows it’s not going to be easy.

“When you talk to us five to 10 years from now,” shesays, “the hardest things we’ll have done will be whatwe do on this cost journey. We want to be the only oneswho can produce this at parity with nylon. That’s whatwe’re focused on more than anything else.”

“There’s this love-hate relationshipwith how farwe’ve come,” saysSheertex’s founder.“If I’d known howhard it would be, Idon’t think I wouldhave done this.Ignorance allowed usto make some leapsno one else wouldhave made”

Business is changing,so is HaskayneA place for students and the community to gather, connect and learn.The Haskayne School of Business is expanding with the addition of Mathison Hall,a beautiful new building set to be completed in Fall 2022. As the economic landscape changesin Alberta and beyond, so does the nature of business education. These changes demandnew programs, new ways of thinking, new technology and a new approach to learning.The opening of Mathison Hall is a once-in-a-generation opportunity, and it’s an exciting timefor the Haskayne community.

Learn more, visit: haskayneexpansion.com

Getoutsideyourcomfortzoneandreachouttosuccessfulpeople

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asked simple questions. As the student, there’s noquestion I can ask that’s stupid. The late John BitoveSr. is one of the people I spent a lot of time with—healways said I was like his son, and he answered anyquestions I wanted answered. If there’s a successfulperson who has time for me, then I will absolutelylearn from them.

Any time I hear about racism raising its uglyhead—and with Rodney King and George Floyd,people were filming and reporting on it—mythought is obviously to encourage people to vote,to get into politics and speak out. But my fatheralways said the greatest way to combat racism is towork hard and be successful. That’s the exampleI’ve lived by. I always say that if you don’t put inthe work, you’re not going to get the desired result.The first thing is you have to find passion in whatyou’re doing. Two, do your research. Three, you’vegot to be disciplined. If I’m trying to raise money,my entire focus will be on that. And I’m gonnago around you, over you, under you—or, if you’restanding in my way, I’m gonna go through you. If Iencounter racism along the way, that’s somethingI’ll deal with later on. It’s like if my focus is on the100 metres, I’m not going to be worried about a raceI lost along the way. My goal is to actually be in therace. If I want to win, I have to be participating.

The last thing, and this is probably most impor-tant, is to reach out to the people who can guide you.Because they’ve been there before, and it makes thepath easier for you to reach your own goals.

I’m generally an optimistic guy. We’re actuallyhaving conversations about racism today. Pro-tests are happening. Companies are making mea-sures for change. There is government and cor-porate involvement. If we want racialized peopleto be in the boardroom, then business leadershave to get them into those rooms and ask ques-tions. It is our job to listen, to understand theirjourney, to know where they’re coming from andwhere they’re going. At least we’re moving onwardand upward. /Interview by Rita Trichur

Run toward successOlympic sprinter Donovan Bailey—whoseBailey Inc. has investments in real estate,restaurants, and the health and wellness industry—on the barriers facing Black entrepreneurs

I spoke out about racism at the 1996 Games, whenit was not cool. I thought that because I was used tobeing in the boardroom and had grown up aroundsuccessful people of all cultures, when I was askedabout racism as an athlete in Atlanta, I could answerthat question honestly. Unfortunately, I was black-balled. Some people in the non-racialized commu-nity thought I was just an athlete. I don’t know if I’vefaced systemic racism as an entrepreneur, though,because I’ve bankrolled most of my projects myself.I’ve never gone to a bank to borrow money—eitherI’ve had my own or I’ve had great partners.

This is what I tell all entrepreneurs, especiallyBlack ones: Networking is the greatest asset youcan have. You must get outside your comfort zoneand reach out to successful people. As a sprinter, Iwanted to be the very best in the world. I felt thesame way about business. So I’ve always soughtout the most successful people—in Toronto, Lon-don, Singapore, New York City, Silicon Valley—and

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Here’s to Canada’sBest Managed Companies,who are leading withpurpose and forging aheadFor over 20 years CIBC has proudly helpedCanada’s Best Managed companies with makingtheir ambitions a reality by providing financial expertiseand timely business advice.

Congratulations to the 2022 winners!

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CANADA'S BEST MANAGED COMPANIES 2022