Northern Ontario businesses have two weeks to register for a business-to-business matchmaking event that offers in-depth networking and new investment opportunities.
Naturallia, taking place Oct. 28-30 in Sault Ste. Marie, will bring together business people from across the globe for a speed dating event to connect with businesses operating in four of the North’s strongest sectors: advanced manufacturing; value-added forest products; mining supply and services; and smart energy development, supply and services.
The initiative is a joint effort by the Sault Ste. Marie Innovation Centre, the city’s Economic Development Corporation, and RDEE, the economic development organization for Franco-Ontario.
Naturallia will be an ideal opportunity for the North to showcase itself and its businesses and use Canada’s natural resources to create business alliances, said Jason Naccarato, the innovation centre’s vice-president of development.
“It’s really an opportunity for Northern Ontario,” Naccarato said. “We want Northern Ontario to put their best foot forward and show their best and brightest companies at this event and, hopefully, with the intent of bringing a lot of those investment dollars to the North.”
Fifteen countries are represented amongst the delegates who have registered to date.
With the $1,200 registration cost, participants are completely taken care of, Naccarato said. The fee includes meals, transportation around the city, and access to social events, along with the planned business events.
Highlights of Naturallia will include access to international trade experts, a keynote address by Sean Wise, a professor of entrepreneurship and innovation with the Ted Rogers School of Management at Ryerson University, as well as industry tours of local companies like Essar Steel Algoma, Heliene, Boniferro Mill Works and the Ontario Forestry Research Centre.
But central to the event are one-on-one 30-minute meetings between businesses whose interests intersect, said Tom Dodds, CEO at the city’s EDC. Participants are guaranteed 13 “dates” with participants.
“In terms of the individuals and organizations going, you’ve got a very rich mixture of small business, larger corporations and organizations such as ourselves that really are there in the game of promoting economic and business development,” Dodds said.
The speed-dating format allows business owners to ascertain very quickly whether or not their “date” will provide some value to them, whether it’s connections with other people or businesses.
“It’s an incredible networking opportunity,” Dodds said. “It establishes an ability to reach out and communicate with all manners of people and it helps build some of the businesses that you may have never considered getting involved with in the first place.”
The Naturallia format is modelled on Centrallia, a similar event held in Winnipeg last year, where Naccarato and Dodds first made their pitch for the Sault as a host city.
As at Centrallia, contact information about participating businesses will be compiled into a booklet that participants can take home at the end of the conference.
“Talking to some of the companies that went to Centrallia, in a lot of their views, this book alone, with basically a roadmap on how to connect with 200 companies, was worth its weight in registration, other than all the other extra added-value things that happened by going to a conference like this,” Naccarato said.
The deadline to register for Naturallia is Monday, Sept. 30.
For more information, contact the Sault Ste. Marie Innovation Centre at 705-942-7927, or visit www.naturallia.com.
