eetimes.com, May. 15, 2025 –
Canada’s chip industry wants to grow, but there is debate over which capabilities the country should focus on and how to best finance that growth.
At the recent CHIPS NORTH Executive Summit in Ottawa, panelists and guest speakers talked about the challenges that come with growing a semiconductor industry in a country that is geographically large, yet sparsely populated. Mickey Aleksic, site manager for Qualcomm Canada, said it is too expensive to facilitate semiconductor fabs in Canada, and it will take too long.
“We were too late in the game anyway.” The optimum time to start was two decades ago, he added.
The modern semiconductor sector is moving very fast, Aleksic said, and having a strong education system is essential, as well as experienced people if the sector is to grow in Canada. Another critical element is the cost structure, especially when it comes to volume production.
He said one approach to growing Canada’s semiconductor industry is getting large international companies to seed the country; the other is to support home grown companies with both local and international investment. Qualcomm has a large footprint in Canada focused on design, as does Siemans EDA through its acquisition of Solido Design Automation in 2017.
Alphawave Semi is a homegrown company out of Toronto with a global presence. Founder and CEO Tony Pialis graduated from the University of Toronto as an engineer and opted to stay in Canada to grow his career, unlike many of his peers who opted to go south of the border. The previous three businesses he was involved in were all steppingstones toward Alphawave, he said, two of which were acquired by U.S. companies to become satellite offices that have diminished in size.