A new private testing centre in Canada’s North is inviting defence companies to trial their technologies in a region singled out by Ottawa as a spending priority to defend the country’s borders.
Arjun Grewal, founder of the Arctic Training Centre, which is headquartered just outside Whitehorse.Blair Gable/The Globe and Mail
The Arctic Training Centre, founded by entrepreneur and Canadian Armed Forces veteran Arjun Grewal, will offer space to companies from Canada and its allied countries to test their products on northern and Arctic landscapes, and prove their effectiveness in contributing to Canada’s mission there.
The centre will help ensure tools used by the Canadian Forces in the Arctic are actually tested in a northern climate. Often, Mr. Grewal said federal government procurements that go awry in the North are sent to technology hubs in warmer climates to be re-engineered and lack consultation with those living and working in the North.
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“We all kind of scratch our heads like ‘Why are these technologies being built in California and being delivered to the Arctic?’ It’s no wonder they don’t work,” Mr. Grewal said.
Prime Minister Mark Carney has identified the Arctic as a likely target for a chunk of his new defence budget, as he works to boost Canada’s defence-related spending to 5 per cent of gross domestic product by 2035.
Despite accounting for approximately 75 per cent of Canada’s coastline and almost 40 per cent of its land mass, the country’s Arctic and northern regions have been left vulnerable to threats, in part because of aging infrastructure and a lack of surveillance.
According to a 2022 report by the Auditor-General of Canada, ship traffic in the Arctic more than tripled between 1990 and 2019 in conjunction with the melting of sea ice caused by climate change. Yet the Auditor-General also found that federal organizations, such as the Canadian Coast Guard and National Defence, had little awareness of who or what this traffic uptick consisted of and had diminishing means to find out.
This could soon change, as Mr. Carney sets his sights on the northern region and companies vying for a portion of his increased defence budget do the same.
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In March, he announced the federal government would spend more than $6-billion on radar to detect threats over the Arctic and nearly $420-million to increase the Canadian Forces’ presence there. In June, he included developing new drones, sensors and radar to monitor the Arctic as priorities in his plan to rearm the country.
But to improve Canada’s showing in the North, it first needs the technologies and knowledge to do so. That’s where the Arctic Training Centre comes in, Mr. Grewal said.
To start, he’s using his personal and partner funds to open the Yukon-based venture. He plans to seek private capital investors later on. By relying on private capital, Mr. Grewal said he hopes to give companies an easier and faster route to access testing grounds that aren’t subject to the same restrictions, wait-lists or security clearances as several of the publicly funded sites across Canada.
Arjun Grewal's Arctic Training Centre will help test any technology except for heavy ammunitions and explosives, he says.Blair Gable/The Globe and Mail
From drones, to sleeping bags, to communications equipment, the centre will welcome any technology except for heavy ammunitions and explosives. Mr. Grewal said he draws the line there.
He said the centre aims to test technologies used for surveillance, reconnaissance communication and threat detection “because that’s what the future war will need at scale.”
The centre’s headquarters consists of a roughly 929-square-metre industrial space about a five-minute drive outside of Whitehorse. But through partnerships with local First Nations, its capacity extends well beyond that, Mr. Grewal said.
For example, Mr. Grewal said he has spoken to a lot of drone companies that struggle to find testing grounds in Canada. If they came to the Arctic Training Centre, he would take their request to the local communities the centre has partnered with to see if any of them is interested in hosting a test. Revenue from the operation would then be shared between the centre and the community.
It’s a model he calls “landscape as a service.”
To ensure the private facility’s work translates into benefits for Canada’s North, the government of Yukon has signed a memorandum of understanding with the Arctic Training Centre.
Ranj Pillai, Yukon’s Minister of Economic Development, said it’s unrealistic to think the Canadian government can accomplish all it has set out to do alone – and on time. It must consider the private sector an essential partner, he said.
“When we take a look at our adversaries that have infrastructure in the Arctic, bringing in Canadian companies that can work very closely in a public-private partnership to build infrastructure is going to be important,” he added.
There are limited defence technology testing facilities in Canada, and some companies end up travelling to the U.S. or other countries to perform tests, according to the Canadian Association of Defence and Security Industries. Canada has 13 sites certified by NATO’s Defence Innovation Accelerator for the North Atlantic, or DIANA, many of which are based out of universities or supported by the National Research Council.
Mr. Grewal said he has reached out to DIANA to discuss certification, which brings benefits such as funding and promotion through its network.
It’s the location and the speed at which companies and their technology can get in for testing that sets the Arctic Training Centre apart, Mr. Grewal said.
The centre recently announced its first customers, including Canadian defence tech firm Dominion Dynamics, which is working to build an Arctic sensor network. It’s also getting expertise from partners such as Indigenous-owned Alpha-El Inc., which is building AI-enabled video surveillance hardware for the North, as well as Kitchener, Ont.-based IMT Group, which does manufacturing work for the defence sector.
“All these technologies that need to be built rapidly to address rapidly changing threats, I feel the private sector is the only body that can do that. And I think economically for Canada, it’s the right approach,” Mr. Grewal said.