A message is given that the time to grow, compete, and lead on the global stage is now.  Canada needs future-shaping industries with bold ambition to carry growth forward.

March 22nd is World Water Day. A day to reflect on the importance of water.  A challenge for humans today on a global stage is the growing awareness of the need for the caring of the earth, water, and repair of the environmental damage.

The spring equinox just occurred on March 20th.  The spring equinox was the official new year for many global cultures around the world, including the Algonkian tribes in the northeast of Turtle Island (North America today).  It is a day of balance, whereby, with the line up of the sun and moon, there is an equal amount of daylight and darkness. The return of the longer light of the sun to make things grow.

The moon controls the waters, including the tides. It represents the female water teachings connected to the carrying of water in the womb that brings new life. The sun is fire energy, which is represented by the male. In the culture, women are considered the “keepers of the waters” and men the “keepers of the fire.” The contrast is important in bringing in and sustaining new life. Similar to the sun and moon cycles impacting the Earth.

To many Indigenous nations, the earth is considered a living entity, and instructions were given in the caretaking of the land and its richness through oral history. Today, this is known as traditional knowledge.  An example of this understanding is that the rivers and streams were seen as the veins of earth, like the human body.  The human body is made up of about 70 percent water. Interestingly, about 71 percent of the earth’s surface is also water covered. The oceans hold about 96.5 percent of all Earth’s water, leaving only 3.5% freshwater globally. Utmost care is needed in preserving this resource.

The ancestors foretold that humans will be at a crossroads in the caretaking of the earth. That water would someday be for sale and not everyone will have a right to safe water.

As the Elders would remind the people in gatherings in the past: “We are here for future generations and it is not only human nations but also the animal nations, the winged nations, the ones that swim nations, the plant nations, the minerals, etc.”

With the need for industry to grow, compete, and lead on the global stage, we need to include the rising challenge of reparation and preservation of water for earth’s balance with this growth. A challenge to be seen not as a burden but an opportunity for innovative growth.

By: Elder Verna McGregor, Kitigan Zibi Anishinabeg First Nation

If you can prove your tech works in real marine operations, you have a foundation for a global business.

The ocean is harsh. That’s why marine innovation can move into defence faster

Canada is a maritime nation bordered by three oceans and shaped by long coastlines, busy ports, and Northern waters that demand competence, not hype.

I started my career as a Naval Engineering Officer in the Royal Canadian Navy and later became an entrepreneur. Those two worlds taught me the same lesson: the marine environment is unforgiving, and it quickly shows you what’s real. Salt, cold, corrosion, vibration, and intermittent connectivity pose significant challenges to innovation, so if your technology works both offshore and on the waterfront, you’ve already passed a test most sectors never face.

That’s why many ocean-tech companies are closer to defence relevance than they think. And because marine operations generate huge volumes of sensor and operational data, AI is moving from a nice-to-have to an operational advantage.

Why this matters now for Canada

Canada’s new Defence Industrial Strategy makes one thing clear: national security and sovereignty aren’t just about what we buy, they’re about the strength of Canadian companies that can design, build, and maintain capability over decades.

From an OSC perspective, this is a meaningful opportunity for the ocean sector. By proving our technology at home, we’re not only serving domestic needs, but we’re also building strong foundations for Canadian marine products and services to compete in allied markets where reliability matters more than hype. If you have traction in the commercial marine space, you already have one of the most credible “business cards” in the world.

“Ocean-ready” is more than a slogan

Defence doesn’t just need clever ideas; it needs gear that won’t quit when conditions become tough. Defence needs systems that are:

Reliable: systems that keep working in harsh conditions and still perform after months of real operations, not just during a controlled demo.
Sustainable: tools that can be maintained with practical spares, documentation, and trained hands, so they can be deployed repeatedly at scale, especially in remote and harsh environments.
Secure & interoperable: It must work with other systems and stay protected against cyber threats.
Scalable: It needs to graduate from a “one-off success” to something we can roll out reliably, and repeatedly, without reinventing the system each time.

In plain terms: the marine environment is a built-in stress test. If you’re selling to ports, subsea companies, or coastal monitoring, you’re already being measured against these realities. Marine customers have near-zero tolerance for downtime, which is a mindset that translates well to national security.

AI at the edge: because the middle of the ocean has no cloud

We’re drowning in data but starving for insight. Modern maritime operations generate massive amounts of data, including radar, AIS, imagery, acoustics, telemetry, weather, and more. The challenge isn’t a lack of data, but how quickly we can interpret that data to assess what is happening.

In a high-stakes environment, an operator doesn’t need a raw data dump, they need a prioritized picture and confidence they can act on. This is where AI fits. Across the OSC ecosystem, we are seeing AI move to the edge, meaning it’s running directly on the ship or buoy rather than waiting for a satellite link to a server on land.

That “data-to-decision” speed is critical. Whether you’re optimizing commercial operations or maintaining awareness of unidentified activity in remote waters, the goal is the same: move from raw data to confident action before the window closes. In defence contexts, that speed must come with clear human oversight, traceability, and secure data handling.

The barrier: technology versus translation

The question now is: why don’t we see more ocean innovation quickly flowing into defence? It’s because “dual-use” isn’t just a label; it’s a translation job.

Marine innovators often hit the same walls:

The language: requirements, compliance, and risk frameworks can feel like a foreign dialect.
The timeline: defence procurement cycles can be longer than commercial cycles, so you need a plan that keeps revenue moving while you qualify.
The trust gap: defence will ask where your data came from, how your models behave in mission-critical edge cases, and how humans remain in control.

None of these are insurmountable, but they can be hard to navigate alone, especially for SMEs with limited resources. It’s possible to board a moving ship in a swell, but it’s much easier with pilotage.

Sovereignty is about people, not just geography

If Canada is serious about sovereignty “coast to coast to coast,” then Indigenous and Inuit participation needs to be treated as foundational and not an afterthought.

Canada’s defence direction emphasizes stronger partnerships in the North. In practice, this means building programs that respect community priorities and create local capacity. A system is only truly “defence-ready” if the people living in the region are part of the leadership, the training, and the long-term support model. That means creating practical pathways to training, employment, local operations roles, and durable support capacity.

How OSC can help

OSC’s role is to help Canada’s ocean innovators prosper. For companies that decide defence is a sector they would like to explore, OSC will continue to develop programming and pathways that make that exploration more practical and more likely to succeed, without losing sight of commercial realities.

OSC’s support can include ecosystem orientation, translation support, and connection to partners who can help with validation, integration, and scaling. This includes ensuring Indigenous and Inuit partners help shape the solutions and bring local knowledge into how systems are designed, tested, deployed, and supported coast to coast to coast.

If defence is on your horizon, don’t wait for a perfect RFP. Document your “salt-water proof,” identify your top readiness gaps (security, integration, supportability), and be ready to engage. OSC will continue to develop programming to help members translate commercial traction into defence relevance and help connections with partners who can validate and scale.

By: James Craig, Chief Development Officer, Canada’s Ocean Supercluster

I recently explored why ocean observation underpins a strong ocean economy. With advances from seabed mapping to real time sensors, we’re seeing the ocean in ways that were unimaginable a few years ago. But observation is only the start. AI and quantum technologies are reshaping decision‑making at sea, and this is Canada’s moment to lead.

The Ocean as a Living Data Layer

Our ocean is becoming increasingly digitized. Sensors are now deployed on vessels, autonomous drones, buoys, and underwater platforms. Low-cost satellites are multiplying the scale and fidelity of Earth observation. For the first time, we’re generating meaningful ocean data at a scale that AI systems can use.

Historically, lack of usable data has been one of the biggest barriers to applying AI in the ocean. Now the challenge is how we structure, share, and act on that data, particularly in real time, in extreme conditions, and across jurisdictions.

From Algorithms to Action: AI in Ocean Applications

AI in ocean isn’t just about building a good model. It’s about sustaining intelligent systems in remote, disconnected, and unpredictable environments. What does that unlock?

Smarter weather prediction to improve safety and operations, from ship routing to offshore wind optimization.
Autonomous inspection of vessels, subsea cables, and offshore platforms using drones paired with agentic AI.
Adaptive digital twins that update with real time data to forecast biodiversity shifts, support stock assessments, and guide infrastructure planning.
Smarter resource management, from monitoring protected areas and detecting illegal fishing to enabling selective gear that reduces bycatch.

We’ve also seen tangible commercial results. ThisFish, an early Ocean Supercluster investment, has boosted efficiency in fish processing through automated quality inspection, proving AI can drive both sustainability and profitability. As well, OnDeck AI, once a $10,000 Ocean Idea Challenge winner, is now emerging as a leader in marine object identification for defence, showing how small AI bets can scale into major outcomes with the right ecosystem.

Ocean Expert Knowledge Important for AI Founders

Building AI for the ocean isn’t like building for fintech or e‑commerce. The ocean is open, unpredictable, and interconnected; it ignores borders and bandwidth limits. To accelerate ocean intelligence, we need to design with those realities in mind.

Some things AI innovators should consider:

The ocean moves in seasons. Missing a weather window can delay your testing by a year. Seasonality affects everything from data collection to validation and deployment.
You’re operating in a contested, regulated space. From Indigenous data sovereignty to international maritime law, AI tools need to be designed with permission, security, and compliance in mind.
Context matters. A model trained in the Pacific might underperform in the Arctic. AI systems must adapt to local conditions and evolving baselines.
Many ocean tech projects still stall between research and real-world deployment. There is still work to do to develop paths from pilot to  product, including investments in market validation, procurement pathways, and deployment infrastructure.
Collaboration: success in ocean AI means working across sectors, engineers, Indigenous leaders, regulators, and researchers. Building trust across these communities is just as important as technical performance.
Designing with AI ethics at the core: respecting data sovereignty, minimizing environmental impact, and ensuring autonomous systems act responsibly. Ethics also means inclusion: rural, remote, and Indigenous communities must have the tools, training, and insights to benefit from ocean innovation, not just experience its effects.

AI Ocean Projects to Watch

Canada’s Ocean Supercluster has co-funded over 150 projects, half of which now feature AI.

Forecast AI: A $4.5M project led by MarineLabs to deliver hyper-local marine weather forecasts using AI, improving safety and operational planning for maritime operators.
Oceanic Digital Twin Maritime Autonomy: A $6M initiative blending digital twins with autonomous maritime systems to increase efficiency, develop predictive maintenance algorithms and support next-generation communications frameworks.
Enhanced Aquaculture Health Monitoring: A $5.9M AI-driven initiative to track fish health in real time and reduce stock losses, helping future-proof global food supply.
Maritime Emergency Response System (MERS): A $1.4M AI system to enhance Canada’s ability to respond to maritime incidents with real time data and decision support.
Environmental Genomics for Aquaculture: A $2.9M project leveraging AI to interpret eDNA for improved pathogen detection and environmental performance in salmon aquaculture.
Smart Hook: A $4M project to build an autonomous recovery system for underwater assets, merging robotics and AI to tackle one of ocean tech’s most operationally difficult problems.

These are commercial-scale projects built with partners, co-investment from industry, and global applicability.

The Quantum Multiplier

Quantum computing could dramatically accelerate what’s possible (see the Canadian National Quantum Strategy). Optimizing marine logistics, simulating ocean-climate interactions, managing high-volume sensor data – these are computationally intensive problems that could be ideally suited to quantum computing as capabilities mature.

Combine quantum with autonomous systems and real time analytics, and we move from reactive to predictive ocean intelligence.

Canada’s Moment: A Leadership Opportunity in Ocean Intelligence

Canada has the world’s longest coastline, vast ocean territory, and strong AI and quantum ecosystems, but these strengths are still too often siloed. Ocean innovators rarely connect with quantum labs, AI founders don’t know the ocean’s urgent challenges, and investors haven’t yet recognized the ocean economy as a major data and intelligence frontier.

It’s also a key moment for dual‑use ocean technologies, where civilian, environmental, and defense needs converge in areas like surveillance, maritime awareness, and autonomous systems. Canada’s reputation for trusted, secure, and resilient tech gives it an edge.

The task now is to build the bridges, linking people, platforms, and capital, so Canada doesn’t just participate in this convergence but helps lead it globally.

A Call to Investors: This Is the Next Frontier

Canada has a generational opportunity to lead in ocean intelligence. With world‑class AI and quantum talent, rapidly expanding ocean datasets, and one of the planet’s most complex marine environments, including an Arctic coastline that spans nearly half the country, we’re positioned to turn this advantage into a global export.

But we need to move quickly and responsibly. For AI and deep‑tech investors, the next frontier isn’t land or space, it’s the ocean.

By: Kendra MacDonald, Chief Executive Officer, Canada’s Ocean Supercluster

The ocean plays a central role in regulating the climate globally. It is the largest carbon storage sink on Earth, stores 45 times more carbon than the atmosphere, and 20 times more than land plants and soil combined. The ocean has already absorbed 40 per cent of fossil fuel emissions and 90 per cent of excess heat, and is continuing to absorb 30 per cent of excess carbon dioxide emissions annually.

This is what marine carbon dioxide removal (mCDR) entails. It is a suite of methods that either amplify or accelerate the ocean’s natural processes – be it biological, physical, or chemical, to reduce carbon in the atmosphere and safely store it in the ocean. Examples of mCDR approaches include ocean alkalinity enhancement, iron fertilization, artificial downwelling and upwelling, and electrochemical techniques.

It won’t come as a surprise that Canada – with the largest coastline in the world, a deep pedigree in ocean science, research, and technology development, mature marine infrastructure, and a vibrant innovation ecosystem – is well positioned to harness the potential of mCDR. But what is the opportunity? That is the question that a recent study led by Canada’s Ocean Supercluster and co-funded by a consortium of organizations across Canada, answers.

The opportunity comes from two levers: climate change mitigation and economic growth.

Climate Change Mitigation

The study estimates that mCDR has the potential to remove 130 metric tons of carbon from the atmosphere per year by 2050. To put this number into context, it represents about 15 per cent of Canada’s current carbon emissions, and 40 per cent of durable carbon removal capacity that Canada will need to be in line with the Paris Agreement’s 1.5-degree goal. In addition, if removals are allowed to be included in Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) – that is, commitments made by Canada to reduce greenhouse gas emissions – then mCDR can significantly help Canada meet those commitments. Beyond emission reductions, some mCDR approaches could also help Canada realize other benefits, such as reduction in acidification of its oceans, protecting marine habitats, and supporting coastal resiliency.

Thus, mCDR can significantly help Canada with its climate mitigation goals by reducing net emissions, developing scaled carbon removal capacity, meeting its international climate commitments, and significantly aiding Canada’s transition to a low carbon economy.

Economic Growth

mCDR also offers a meaningful contribution to Canada’s economic growth prospects via job creation, GDP growth, capital investment, and transitioning of workforce. The study estimates that by 2050 mCDR could:

Create 90,000 new direct permanent jobs across Canada, with indirect job creation likely double of that – this amounts to about a third of Canada’s current total employment in the cleantech sector;
Increase Canada’s GDP by $16B – about a third of Canada’s current ocean economy;
Attract upwards of $30B of domestic and foreign capital investment; and
Contribute to the creation of new investment and export opportunities.

To put the economic projections of mCDR into perspective, Canada’s electricity utility sector currently employs approximately 100,000 people throughout Canada, attracts more than $22 billion in capital investment, and contributes $35 billion to Canada’s GDP – numbers similar to mCDR projections for 2050. Thus, the mCDR sector in Canada in 2050 could be as big as the electricity utility sector is today.

In short, mCDR is not only well-aligned for Canada, but can also significantly contribute to Canada’s strategic objectives of climate competitiveness, transition to a low carbon economy, and economic growth, and should be actively nurtured in a responsible and equitable manner.

mCDR is still in its nascent stage and requires catalytic action from government, private sector, and communities to transform Canada’s starting advantage to be a global leader in mCDR into a lasting advantage.

By: Akash Rastogi, Chief Capital Strategy Officer, Canada’s Ocean Supercluster

Last week in Ottawa, during Ocean Week on the Hill, Canada’s Ocean Supercluster’s Board and Senior Leaders met with more than 50 officials from across eight different departments with the message that Canada’s ocean economy is building tremendous momentum with the opportunity to achieve a bold, 5X growth Ambition by 2035. With a membership of almost 1,000 from across the country, we spoke of the cluster and the broader Canadian ocean network as a national asset and framework from which we can work together to help deliver on Government’s key priorities.

Turning Investment into Impact

Since its inception, the OSC has been advancing a vision of a digital, sustainable, and globally competitive ocean economy. With just over $200 million in OSC ocean innovation project investments to March 2025, the cluster has co-invested alongside industry in close to 150 collaborative projects and has ultimately accelerated the development of more than 300 new ocean products and processes to sell to the world.

A recent economic report by Mansfield Consulting highlights the impact of OSC’s activities and investment with industry to March 2025. The study found that every dollar invested through the Ocean Supercluster generates more than five times its value in GDP contribution, underscoring the long-term economic and societal benefits of building a world-class ocean innovation ecosystem.

Delivering Economic Growth Across Canada

The economic impacts of OSC’s work to March 2025 includes:

$1.7 billion in total economic output
$1 billion in GDP contribution
Nearly $748 million in total labour income
Close to 10,000 jobs created
$286 million in total tax revenues generated
$295 million in follow-on investment raised

These numbers reflect more than financial returns; they represent new companies formed, new technologies brought to market, and a growing community of innovators creating sustainable prosperity through ocean opportunities. Through work of the OSC, 200 new ocean companies have been created, and 85 million people have learned more about the significance of the ocean economy through marketing campaigns.

Canada’s Ocean Moment

As Canada focuses on diversification of global partnerships, expanded market opportunities for made in Canada products and services, increased focus on defence and dual use opportunities, climate adaptation and resiliency, and meeting the moment in the transition of energy, food security, arctic activity and building a stronger economy and thriving communities for the future, we know this moment is also Canada’s ocean moment.

As the Government of Canada prepares to deliver strategies focused on AI, industrial defence, trade diversification, and climate competitiveness in the months to come, it is our ocean and Canada’s Ocean Supercluster that is at the ready to help mobilize, accelerate, and realize some of the most important opportunities of our time.

By: Nancy Andrews, Chief Engagement and Communications Officer, Canada’s Ocean Supercluster