Past issues
Every Ottawa Brew newsletter we've published. Newest first.
- Issue #18 · 2026-09-16Read →
A new chair at Invest in Canada, a $1B AI fund, and Ottawa's talent reshuffle
Issue #18 | Wednesday, September 16, 2026 Three leadership moves landed in Ottawa's orbit this week — and they tell a bigger story about where power is shifting. Dominic Barton is now chair of Invest in Canada, the federal agency tasked with pulling $1 trillion in investment into the country. Radical Ventures just closed Canada's largest-ever VC fund at $1 billion USD. And across the city, the people who run things are changing. Today we track who moved, who's out, and what it means for the ecosystem.
- Issue #17 · 2026-08-19Read →
Adrian Sciarra just left the Redblacks – and Ottawa's talent story is bigger than football.
Ottawa's executive layer is shifting. Three years into the job, Adrian Sciarra is out as Redblacks president – and OSEG is hunting for someone who can rebuild a franchise that's 0-and-9. On the same day, CBRE dropped its annual tech talent report: Ottawa still employs more tech workers per capita than anywhere in North America, but the growth has stalled and the ranking slipped three spots in two years. Two very different leadership stories. Both worth your full attention this Wednesday.
- Issue #16 · 2026-08-12Read →
Ottawa's talent is moving. The question is whether it's moving up – or out.
Issue #16 | Wednesday, August 12, 2026 Five Ottawa tech leaders changed roles this week. That's not unusual for a Wednesday in August – people move, titles shift, org charts get redrawn. What's unusual is the backdrop: a new Council of Canadian Innovators report out yesterday found that in 93% of Canadian tech acquisitions, strategic decision-making leaves the country entirely. The talent stays. The power doesn't. Today we look at who's moving where – and what it means when the ecosystem keeps producing leaders it can't always keep.
- Issue #15 · 2026-08-06Read →
Shopify just printed $3.58B – and Ottawa's job market is still bleeding
Issue #15 | Thursday, August 6, 2026 Ottawa loves a good tech success story. Shopify delivered one yesterday – $3.58 billion in Q2 revenue, stock up, analysts happy. But walk ten minutes from any Kanata campus and you'll find a city where 30,500 jobs have vanished in 18 months and the unemployment rate just hit 6.9%. Both things are true at once. That's the Ottawa economy in 2026: world-class companies printing record quarters while the public-sector floor falls out beneath them. Today we dig into both sides of that ledger.
- Issue #14 · 2026-07-31Read →
3 Ottawa stories worth your long weekend read ☕
Issue #14 | Friday, July 31, 2026 Everyone says Ottawa slows down in summer. The data disagrees. This week: a decade-old Ottawa SaaS company just got a majority investor with a track record of taking data backup firms public. A uOttawa engineer is building an AI therapist that might actually be safe – one that can't hallucinate its way into a crisis. And July 2026 just became the wettest month in Ottawa's recorded history, which, given the summer we've had, feels about right. Enjoy the long weekend. We'll be back Tuesday.
- Issue #13 · 2026-07-28Read →
Is Canada building sovereign AI on a foundation of foreign chips? ☕
Issue #13 | Tuesday, July 28, 2026 Canada's AI strategy has a chip-shaped hole in it. While Ottawa talks sovereign compute and pours billions into AI contracts, the industry group representing 60 domestic semiconductor companies is pointing out the obvious: you can't build sovereign AI on someone else's silicon. Today we dig into that gap, plus Assent's bold claim that it's about to own a global compliance market, Kinaxis's new financial brain arriving from Wall Street, and a 3,500-job prize Ottawa is fighting three other Canadian cities to win.
- Issue #12 · 2026-06-04Read →
30,500 jobs gone, a $229M infrastructure hole, and Ottawa's fiscal reckoning ☕
Thirty thousand five hundred jobs. That's how many Ottawa-area positions disappeared in the twelve months ending February 2026 – the steepest employment drop in Ontario. The unemployment rate now sits at 6.6%. The city's long-range financial plan, approved this week, puts a number on the infrastructure backlog: $229 million a year, with 130 facilities hitting end-of-life by 2035. Thursday in Ottawa: the numbers are in, and they're not comfortable.
- Issue #11 · 2026-06-03Read →
Evan Solomon just handed Canada's cybersecurity team the most powerful AI on the planet ☕
The capital's AI pivot isn't theoretical anymore. Canada has spent years debating AI strategy while other countries deployed it. That changed this week. Minister Evan Solomon confirmed Ottawa has joined Anthropic's Project Glasswing – giving the Canadian Centre for Cybersecurity access to Claude Mythos, an AI model so capable Anthropic won't release it publicly. The government is using it to find zero-day vulnerabilities in critical infrastructure before adversaries do. Separately, uOttawa is restructuring how it connects its research to industry – and a federal workforce shift is quietly reshaping the public service. Wednesday in Ottawa: the people moves matter as much as the policy.
- Issue #10 · 2026-06-02Read →
Canada wants 90,000 AI jobs. It still buys 85% of its cloud from U.S. firms. ☕
Ottawa's policy week is already moving fast. The federal government is days away from releasing its national AI strategy – and the leaked draft is more ambitious than most expected. A Canadian Tech Growth Fund. Government equity stakes in AI companies. A target of 90,000 AI-related jobs by 2031. At the same time, the 'Buy Canadian' procurement threshold is quietly dropping from $25 million to $5 million, which means a lot more federal contracts are about to get a domestic-first filter. And at CANSEC last week, Ottawa-area defence firms reported the biggest show in the event's history. The capital's policy machine is running hot. Here's what you need to know.
- Issue #8 · 2026-05-21Read →
Is Ottawa's office market about to get its first real break in five years? ☕
The federal government has spent two years cutting its workforce and shrinking its office footprint. Now it's ordering 300,000 public servants back to their desks four days a week. The contradiction is obvious – and the commercial real estate market is already pricing it in. Downtown Ottawa's office availability rate hit 14.3% at the end of 2025, nearly double the pre-pandemic level. That number is about to move. Whether it moves in the right direction depends on whether the government can find enough desks for the people it's sending back. Spoiler: it can't.
- Issue #7 · 2026-05-17Read →
Bill C-22, a quantum unicorn, and CityFolk's new home ☕
Three stories worth your Sunday morning. Canada's tech sector is drawing a line in the sand over Bill C-22 – and the names signing on to oppose it read like a who's who of the industry. Apple, Signal, Shopify's CEO. Separately, a Sherbrooke quantum startup just crossed the billion-dollar threshold, making Canada home to four quantum unicorns. And Ottawa's summer music calendar got a lot more interesting this week. Here's what you need to know before the long weekend wraps up and the work week kicks off.
- Issue #6 · 2026-05-16Read →
Rebecca Leslie scored twice. The Charge still lost. ☕
Two overtime losses. One series. Everything still to play for. Two games in Montreal. Two overtime losses by a single goal. The Ottawa Charge are down 2-0 in the PWHL Walter Cup Finals – and somehow, the series feels closer than the scoreboard suggests. Rebecca Leslie has scored all four of Ottawa's goals across both games. The Charge outshot the Victoire in Game 1. They held a lead in Game 2. Both times, Montreal tied it in the final seconds and won in OT. Game 3 is Monday at Canadian Tire Centre. Ottawa has been here before. The city hasn't.
- Issue #5 · 2026-05-15Read →
Nokia wants to double its Ottawa headcount — and Kanata is ready ☕
Good morning, Capital. Here's what you missed while you were sleeping. Ottawa's tech sector woke up to some genuinely good news today — Nokia Canada is eyeing a major workforce expansion in Kanata, and Kinaxis just posted record profits. Meanwhile, Ottawa chip firms are winning federal dollars, and the sovereign AI debate is getting real. Pour yourself something strong. Let's get into it. ☕
- Issue #4 · 2026-05-14Read →
Kinaxis just broke records — and global chaos is the reason ☕
Good morning, Capital. Here's what you missed while you were sleeping. Kanata's Kinaxis just posted its best quarter ever — and the secret ingredient is geopolitical instability. Meanwhile, Ottawa's defence tech scene is heating up fast, the feds are writing cheques for AI companies, and city hall is debating whether to track drugs through the sewer system. (Yes, really.) We've also got the full picture on why Canadian VC is hitting a decade-low deal count — and what that means for Ottawa's startup founders trying to raise right now. Pour yourself something strong. Let's get into it. ☕
- Issue #3 · 2026-05-13Read →
Kanata just got Canada's only nuclear test lab — and OC Transpo has a plan ☕
Good morning, Capital. Here's what you missed while you were sleeping. Today's edition is a tale of two Ottawas: the one quietly building world-class defence infrastructure in Kanata, and the one still waiting for two-car trains to show up on time. Both stories matter — and both say something about where this city is headed. We've also got Kinaxis flexing on Bay Street, a jobs number that's better than the national picture, and the opening salvo in the Ottawa-vs-Toronto battle for Canada's new Defence Bank. Pour yourself something strong. Let's get into it. ☕
- Issue #2 · 2026-05-12Read →
Ottawa's Photonic Valley moment, Kinaxis breaks records, and the Charge are back in the finals ☕
Good morning, Capital. Here's what you missed while you were sleeping. Ottawa had a big week — and we're not just talking about the Charge punching their ticket to the Walter Cup Finals (though yes, that too). The federal government quietly dropped a bombshell: the Canadian Photonics Fabrication Centre is opening to private investment. If you haven't heard of it, you will. It's the only photonics foundry of its kind in North America, and some very smart people are comparing this moment to early Silicon Valley. Meanwhile, Kinaxis just posted its best quarter ever — record profit, record revenue, AI doing the heavy lifting. And Ottawa's AI minister confirmed Canada still has no semiconductor strategy, which is a choice. Pour yourself something strong. Let's get into it. ☕
- Issue #1 · 2026-05-11Read →
Ottawa's Photonic Valley moment — and Kinaxis just had its best quarter ever
Good morning, Capital. Here's what you missed while you were sleeping. Ottawa's tech scene had a big week — and we're not talking about the tulips. The federal government opened the door to private investment in the world's best photonics foundry, which happens to sit right here in the Ottawa Valley. Meanwhile, Kanata's Kinaxis posted a record quarter and its stock rewarded investors accordingly. On the policy front, the CRA's return-to-office math isn't adding up — literally — and the mayor's race is already getting spicy with five months still to go. Pour yourself something strong. Let's get into it. ☕