Prince Edward Island

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Prince Edward Island

• Sustainable. Scalable. Beautiful.

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Prince Edward Island
Where rush hour doesnt exist ... and the beaches
are everywhere Where almost 1 million tourists
come every year to get away ... a place voted
Canadas 1 golf destination A place that Royal
LePage calls Canadas most affordable housing
location...
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Location

• Within a 3-hour drive of Prince Edward Island
• 2 Million People
• 18 Cities
• 19 Universities
• 27 Community Colleges

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Access
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Vibrant Sector

• There are more than 2200 ICT professionals in
  the province
• More than 100 companies in a diverse sector
  ranging from multinationals to start-ups, in all
  stages from emerging to established.
• Growing verticals include ehealth, gaming, IT
  consultancy and shared services

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A Diversified Sector
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Game Development
Yodoki games
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Made in PEI
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Why Prince Edward Island?
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• Low operating costs
• Skilled and available workforce
• World-class infrastructure
• Government support

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The KPMG 2010 Competitive Index compared business
costs in more then 100 cities Prince Edward
Island ranked as one of the most cost effective
locations in North America for Advanced Software
and Shared Services.
1. Cost Competitiveness
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KPMG Competitiveness Index
Advanced Software www.competitivealternatives.com
Study completed with Can-US dollars at par
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1. Cost Competitiveness

• Favourable commercial real estate prices and new
  construction offer grade A office facilities
  and amenities at lower costs.
• 14-25/ sq ft
• Dramatically lower residential real estate prices
  (1/3 of major U.S. metropolitan areas), translate
  directly to lower costs to hire and retain more
  highly skilled employees.
• 200,000 2,000 sq ft

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1. Cost Competitiveness

• Average ICT salary in PEI is 52,000
• Junior coders 40K
• Intermediate 50K
• Senior 75K

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- Average job tenure in Prince Edward Island
is 8.5 years- 43 of workers have been with the
same employer for more than 6 years- Days lost
per worker in Prince Edward Island is the lowest
in Canada
2. Workforce
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-Many of the companies in PEI have been able
to attract staff to PEI from the US, the UK,
India , Brazil , etc-Great place to raise a
family-The Province has a program to allow for
permanent residency by-passing some of the
Federal limitations- 200 resumes on hand for
game development
2. Workforce
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2. Workforce

• -UPEI offers specialization in Video Game
  Programming
• -Holland College offers a 2 yr program in Video
  Game Art Design
• -GameForce Government offers introductory
  sessions to teach Jr. high school students how to
  make their own game

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- CGI located in PEI in 2006 and ramped up to
50 people within 6 months. They surpassed 100
within a year. - Invesco (Trimark) located in
PEI in 2007 and ramped up to more than 100 people
within a year and now have more than 200 people
in their Charlottetown location. - Other Ocean
Interactive (game developer) started with 9
people and now have more than 70 in development
and testing.
2. Scalable Workforce
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3. World-Class Infrastructure

• Bell Aliant is investing 20 million to roll out
  Fibre Optic network to 30,000 homes and
  businesses in Charlottetown and Summerside by end
  of 2011.
• Basic services such as Telephony, Internet and
  Entertainment Television, but also has the
  potential to support advanced applications such
  as Tele-medicine, Tele-working, Security, Power
  Monitoring, Remote Home Control, Network Storage,
  Video on Demand, Video Gaming, Video Conferencing
  and e-Learning

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3. World-Class Infrastructure

• The University of Prince Edward Island features a
  Usability Lab for video games, networking and
  ehealth technologies.
• Software Game testing is available in PEI
  through Sculpin QA, who specializes in iPhone,
  Android, PC and Dsi testing
• Data Center services are available through the
  Atlantic Technology Centre, a 136,000 sq ft smart
  building
• Audio support is available through Taris Studios
  and others

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- 30 Video Game Labour Rebate Program ,
rebated quarterly. This is not tied to taxes, and
therefore ideal to help cash flow projects. It is
also available to middleware companies in the
game space.- Atlantic Canada Opportunities
Agency - ACOABusiness Development Program
provides interest-free unsecured loans- Access
to Federal Programs IRAP, NRC, SRED- Levels
of government work together seamlessly - an agile
business environment without red tape
4. Government Partner
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• The Government of Prince Edward Island initiated
  an Innovation and Prosperity Strategy in late
  2008 for specific sectors including ICT. Part of
  the Strategy included grants to companys who
  presented innovative, next generation projects to
  assist with the development of proof of concepts,
  development and commercialization.
• 23 projects have been funded to date in the ICT
  Sector to 18 different companies with a total
  contribution of 929,342
• -The projects include data security, smartphone
  embedded technology toolkits, medical
  technologies, new improved means of data
  management, cognitive assessments of video games,
  remote education tools, and others

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• Pilot Fund provides up to 25,000 to explore a
  concept
• Development Fund provides up to 100,000 for
  Development and Commercialization
• Research Chair provides up to 1M for high level
  leadership and guidance

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Why Prince Edward Island?
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Support, R D, PM, Game Dev

• Companies that have located in PEI have done so
  for various reasons but most have
• found it to be one of their lowest cost locations
  in their organization.
• We are a near shore solution for back end support
• Like many parts of Canada is an ideal location
  for R and D work.
• Project Management. Other companies who have
  clients in the Pacific Time Zone and Europe have
  used PEI as their mid point to locate their
  project management.
• Game teams have come together and stayed
  together. Reducing ongoing retraining costs and
  creating team concept.
• Most West Coast Game Studios have to be twice
  as productive to match location costs in PEI

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Easy Place to do Business

• Some of the strengths in doing business in PEI
  (as referenced by companies that have
• relocated or expanded to PEI)
• Responsive Prospecting Group
• Ability to access high ranking decision makers
• Ease of doing business in PEI when it comes to
  processing claims and other paper work
• Employee loyalty which reduces ongoing training
  costs
• Generally lower employee costs

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Next Steps

• Summary of Work - 2 pages
• Highlights Scale and Scope
• Funding Proposal Response
• Letter of Intention
• Business Plan
• Letters of Offer

You
Us
We
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Contact
Nancy Roberts Prospecting Innovation Programs
Division Innovation PEI 902 368 5336
ndroberts_at_gov.pe.ca

• Visit www.innovationpei.com to learn more.