federal government investing $9 million into alberta defence, manufacturing businesses
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calgary confederation and parliamentary secretary to the minister of energy and natural resources, corey hogan (l), gets a demonstration from jeff lafrenz as he announced investments in alberta’s defence industrial sector in calgary on tuesday, may 12, 2026.
darren makowichuk/postmedia
the federal government is investing $9.3 million into six alberta businesses working in the defence innovation and manufacturing industries.
the funding will be delivered as part of the regional development investment initiative, a three-year multimillion-dollar federal initiative that aims to align long-term military needs with defence investments into regional industries.
it will support innovation in drone service, power-amplifier technology to support monitoring in the arctic region, military virtual technology and investing in local talent in defence manufacturing.
“the global security environment is rapidly evolving, and canada has got to be prepared to defend our sovereignty and uphold our values and stand strong with our allies around the world,” said corey hogan, calgary-confederation mp and parliamentary secretary for the minister of energy and natural resources.
hogan announced the funding on behalf of emergency management and community resilience minister eleanor olszewski, who also heads the prairies economic development canada (or prairiescan), through which the funding will be delivered.
prairiescan is a federal department that is responsible for economic diversification in the prairies.
the funding announcement was hosted at calgary software company vizworx’s offices in downtown calgary on tuesday.
hogan said the funding will support investment in defence innovation technologies and generate economic activity for small- and mid-size alberta businesses.
calgary confederation and parliamentary secretary to the minister of energy and natural resources, corey hogan (l), gets a demonstration from jeff lafrenz as he announced investments in alberta’s defence industrial sector in calgary on tuesday, may 12, 2026.
darren makowichuk/postmedia
canadian uavs, a local drone service provider, will receive $3 million in funding toward amplifying drone technology that provides reconnaissance and situational awareness.
calgary-headquartered microlynx systems and vizworx will receive $2 million each in funding. the former will invest into improving the performance of high-power frequency amplifiers to support arctic domain awareness, while the latter will develop its virtual operations environment (voe) platform to serve as a virtual command centre, integrating maps, live feeds and data tracking to aid in collaborative mission planning and monitoring.
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another $1 million each will go to technalogix, located in red deer, and mro electronic supply, a calgary-based company, which respectively will be invested in developing high-frequency power-amplifier products to monitor airspace and waterways in extreme environmental conditions, and to develop local technical and engineering talent in defence manufacturing and electronics.
calgary-based 3-ci manufacturing will receive $300,900 to develop military-grade cable and wiring systems.
“this investment is about equipment and technology, but it is also about people,” hogan added. “it’s about communities and building lasting economic strength right here in alberta. our support for these projects demonstrates a co-ordinated effort to strengthen our defence sector in alberta and across the prairies.”
funding ‘instrumental’ for small- and medium-sized businesses
jeff lafrenz, president of vizworx, said the funding comes at a time when global conflict exposes the vulnerability in traditional military warfare.
“one of the clearest lessons emerging from ukraine is a traditional centralized command post has become increasingly vulnerable,” he said. “the modern battlefield is saturated with drones, sensors, electronic warfare and long-range precision munition. concentrating command staff and decision-makers in a single location makes them the highest value target on the battlefield, significantly reducing their life expectancy.”
after the announcement, visitors tested a virtual reality program showcasing what a virtual command centre could look like. by putting on a vr headset, users were transported into the middle of a command room surrounded by live operational data displays and a 3-d map showing terrain, assets and team locations.
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the funding program is especially instrumental for small- and medium-sized businesses to strengthen their capacity and competitiveness on the national stage, according to clayton myhill, president and ceo of microlynx systems.
“it gives us options and opportunities and leverage to be able to play with what we didn’t necessarily have,” he said. “the big businesses, they sit there and they get all the glory, but they ride on the back of the smaller and medium businesses.”
it also shortens the pipeline between development and execution of innovation technologies, according to lafrenz.
“small businesses tend to be the primary source of innovation within all ecosystems, including defence,” he said. “if we rely solely upon the large defence prime contractors, we’ve missed the opportunity for some of these innovations to be brought to market faster.”
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