Augustus is said to have said “hasten slowly”. Outlast rather than outrun. The Renaissance Venetian printer Aldus Manutius adopted an emblem of a dolphin coiled around an anchor (seen in the post image): the dolphin is speed, the anchor is restraint. Festina lente.

Today's version might be “slow is smooth, and smooth is fast.”

From its inception, Source Canada has been fixated on speed, or mostly its lack. Solutions to difficult problems, like those threatening our sovereignty and economy, are not true solutions if they take decades to realize.

This is why small companies and very large enterprises and government organizations are strange but ideal bedfellows. Startups operate at an urgent velocity because they have no choice; they are default dead. Rapid innovation is their only chance of surviving until they achieve scale.

503 days after announcing the tearing down of interprovincial trade barriers, it is finally possible, as of July 21, for residents of most provinces to order alcohol from any Canadian producer. We wrote about it previously.

As a litmus test of government change, it didn't happen fast enough. But then again, those barriers have existed for 98 years. Festina lente.

Last week the Defence Drone Initiative was announced, led by the Department of National Defence and the Defence Investment Agency. It creates a pre-qualification marketplace for providers of uncrewed and autonomous systems and their related technologies. By publishing clearer demand signals and a transparent qualification process, DND/DIA is attempting to accelerate the path from new innovation to signed contract.

From the time the DIA was launched to last week's drone initiative was roughly nine and a half months. The program does not commit to any procurement targets or timelines, only to establish a marketplace as a first step.

From the perspective of innovators, nine and a half months is a timeframe where they could have developed multiple new technologies, quickly scaled, or gone out of business. It's a different perspective on the art of the possible.

But relatively speaking this is rapid change. This is the first new program that is designed to take advantage of the speed of startups. It's an encouraging sign and one that may inspire other government programs to pick up the pace.

As an emblem of this partnership we might adopt the dolphin and the anchor.

Highlighted Deals

  • Airbus has invested in Landing Zones, an Alberta drone company, through a strategic partnership for advanced uncrewed systems in Canada. The Logic
  • Bell has laid out an all-Canadian plan to build the infrastructure behind the country's AI capacity. The Logic

Capital

  • Canadian Strategic Missions Corporation has been awarded $4.5 million through the Government of Canada to accelerate micro-nuclear technology for Canada's Arctic. Canadian Defence Review

Defence

  • The Canadian Armed Forces and the Defence Investment Agency have opened a standing marketplace for pre-qualified drone suppliers, with a pre-qualification portal for the domestic sector. Canadian Defence Review · The Icebreaker
  • A group of Canadian companies is building homegrown alternatives to Palantir for military and intelligence software. The Logic
  • The Medicine Hat UAV and Aerospace Innovation Showcase ran July 22 to 25 during the Stampede. Hardware on display included Landing Zones' high-altitude Gitpo remotely piloted system, UVAD's Falcon supersonic UAV and QinetiQ's Hammerhead 750 target drone, which NATO partners use for maritime training. City of Medicine Hat

Policy

  • The premiers signed a final agreement towards Canada-wide direct-to-consumer alcohol sales. Residents of Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and Newfoundland and Labrador can now order from producers anywhere in Canada. CFTA · CBC News
  • The CFIB State of Internal Trade report card gave the federal government an A+, up from a C in 2025, with ten jurisdictions earning an A, driven largely by adoption of mutual recognition legislation. Sixty-nine per cent of small businesses reported no meaningful change in doing business across Canada over the past twelve months, and sixteen per cent said it became harder. The Logic
  • The federal government has opened a public consultation on AI transparency, running July 23 to September 23. It covers how people identify AI-generated content, recognise when they are interacting with an AI system, and understand a system's capabilities and limits. BetaKit

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