The Kanata North Business Association (KNBA) announced today that it is opening a global technology centre for Canada’s largest tech park – Hub350 – in 2021.
Located at 350 Legget Drive, at the core of Ottawa’s special economic zone development project, KNBA says this new space will better facilitate introductions for its member companies to funding resources, research, and new talent, representing the creation of a physical community to support members and their employees, community partners and sponsors. The goal is to bring together industry, academia and finance professionals in Kanata North to further support its member companies.
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Since the Ontario province is still facing restrictions due to the pandemic, Hub350 won’t be open to the public until the summer. Once the centre is fully operative, KNBA says it will implement and adhere to all the safety protocols dictated by the authorities.
The centre will serve as the “gateway to Canada’s largest technology park”, said Jamie Petten, the president and executive director of KNBA, in a press release. “The Hub350 space will be the truest intersection of nature and technology – a trendy, natural atmosphere to attract world-class talent and companies, while showcasing Kanata North as Canada’s destination to live, work, play and learn.”
The future for the next 25 years
The Hub350 is being launched with the aim to better support KNBA’s member companies and further the Ottawa region as one of the world’s leading tech capital, says Vicki Coughey, KNBA chair.
The new hub furthers this aim by serving as a foundation for the technology park’s special economic district designation, a concept developed and co-led by KNBA and City of Ottawa long term planning, economic development teams in support of the national capital region’s new Official Plan. The City of Ottawa’s next Official Plan will support future development across the city and within the technology park over the next 25 years, according to the press release.
“With support from Hub350, teams like ours will be able to set up more meetings with post-secondary institutions, corporate partners and investors in the future. Having these resources available all in one collaborative and dynamic community workspace at the heart of the technology park will be invaluable,” said Tracy King, vice-president of marketing at Martello Technologies. “It’s great to see that, in many ways, we will now have a town hall for the hundreds of tech companies located in Kanata.”
Hub350 will also be the physical home of Canada’s largest aggregated tech job board Discover Technata which seeks to attract job seekers from around the world to Ottawa’s Kanata North as part of the business association’s economic recovery plan to accelerate innovation through the pandemic, according to the announcement.
The 350 Legget location is home to the original Mitel Networks campus, and will be designed by Linebox studios, designers of the Shopify offices. The new hub will be supported by a series of Canadian and multinational enterprise sponsors, which KNBA will announce in the coming weeks.
