CREATE-ing a new plan for the Cornwall Innovation Centre | Cornwall Standard Freeholder
The Cornwall Innovation Centre is no more.
The organization dedicated to fostering new businesses in Cornwall and the surrounding region was given a new name and, hopefully, a fresh start at a relaunch party on Friday.
The centre’s new name is the Cornwall and Region Entrepreneurs Artists and Technologists Exchange, but will most commonly go by its acronym: CREATE.
The Cornwall Innovation Centre was founded in 2017, but since that time, it suffered from an unclear mission with nebulous goals it either failed to meet or implemented poorly. Besides the new name and logo, executive director Eric Bergeron and his board presented a business plan they believe will finally transform the organization into an economic engine.
“We are rebuilding this innovation centre based on other innovation centres,” said Bergeron. “What I tried to do while rewriting and rethinking this business plan was to look at what is working in other communities.”
After looking at other organizations such as the Centre for Social Innovation in Toronto, the Launch Lab in Kingston, and the Innovation Cluster in Peterborough; Bergeron and his team came up with a vision to make CREATE more useful and sustainable than its predecessor has been.
While the Cornwall Innovation Centre had to go hat-in-hand to municipalities to ask for funding and was sometimes turned down, Bergeron says the new business plan will see CREATE become self-sustaining, and quickly.
“We are transitioning to not needing government funding. We are on a two-year timeline to do that, if all goes well. All of these new items have some kind of revenue tied to them,” said Bergeron. “This will allow us to offer services to the companies that need them.”
Co-working space
The heart of the new business plan is the new “co-working space,” CREATE is establishing in Cornwall. The innovation centre has already moved from its former location at the Nav Centre to an almost 700-square-metre (7,500-square-foot) space at the Cotton Mills.
Once it is completed, the co-working space will have 10 to 12 offices for rent by small businesses; more than 30 hot desks where individual entrepreneurs or remote workers would be able to sit down and do their work; and, there will be shared board rooms that can be rented. Memberships will be available for purchase for those who wish to regularly make use of the space.
“It’s going to be, we hope, the hub of business activity in the city and the region,” said Bergeron. “We think there is a big need for this in our community right now.”
Although CREATE has already moved, it is not the only organization setting up there. Several companies have decided to take up residence at the co-working space as anchor tenants. This includes the Cornwall and the Counties Community Futures Development Corp., the Eastern Ontario Training Board, Futurpreneur Canada, BDC, Shopify, Launch Lab and RBC. Those using the co-working space will have easy access to these organizations and the services they offer.
“It’s so exciting, we are super-stoked to be bringing this to the community,” said Martha Woods from the EOTB. “We can’t wait to move in.”
The tentative floor plan for CREATE’s co-working space, shown on Friday October 25, 2019 in Cornwall, Ont. Alan S. Hale/Cornwall Standard-Freeholder/Postmedia Network
Alan S. Hale /
Alan S. Hale/Standard-Freeholder
Event venue
Aside from having a place to go and get some work done, the co-working space will also incorporate an event venue and a makerspace.
Located right on the St. Lawrence River, and including a patio, Bergeron said he wants to see the 140-square-metre (1,500-square-foot) event space be the premier venue for community and business events in Cornwall. The naming rights for the facility are also up for sale.
There will also be a 46-square-metre (500-square-foot) makerspace located inside the Cotton Mills location, which will have equipment such as 3D printers; laser cutters; photo, video and audio editing equipment; lighting and cameras; podcasting gear; hand tools; computers; whiteboards; and, a green screen.
It will also have its own part-time manager, offer training and after-school programs, as well as equipment rentals.
The makerspace is being funded with a $35,000 grant from the Rural Innovation Initiative Eastern Ontario, but the consultant who worked on the makerspace plan, Stephen Burke, said he would like to see that funding eventually reach $65,000. The naming rights of this facility are also for sale.
The Cornwall Innovation Centre’s inability to get its clients to access to investors was one of the main criticisms against it.
CREATE intends to solve this by joining two different angel investor networks: the Southeastern Ontario Angel Network (SOAN) and the Capital Angel Network.
Entrepreneurs working with CREATE will be able to pitch their businesses to the local investors at SOAN, and if there are no takers, they can then go to the Ottawa-based investors at Capital.
Those same investors would also be able to take advantage of a wide variety of services for startup companies, including boot camps on various topics, a mentorship network, consultants and a startup fund. That fund currently has $16,000 in it already from corporate and private donations.
“The next three months of my life will be to get that from $16,000 to $60,000,” said Bergeron.
Ontario Emerging Jobs Institute
Lastly, it was announced CREATE would continue running the Ontario Emerging Jobs Institute, even though the government funding that supported its first run earlier this year at the Nav Centre has still not been renewed.
“We are hoping this continues because it is a valuable resource for the community,” said Bergeron.
In the meantime, CREATE is partnering with the Glengarry Inter-Agency Group to do a course next month that would see the handful of graduates go straight into job placements.