With a mission to inform, empower, celebrate and advocate for British Columbia's current and aspiring business leaders, BCBusiness go behind the headlines and bring readers face to face with the key issues and people driving business in B.C.
Issue link: http://digital.canadawide.com/i/751527
(ABOVE RIGHT) NIK WEST 14 BCBUSINESS DECEMBER/JANUARY 2017 re–ect the anticipation that, poised at the dawn of 2017, the B.C. tech sector is set to boom. Slack isn't the only driver of that potential phenomenon. Microsoft invested $120 million in its Vancouver facility this past year, where it eventually intends to employ 750 people. Hootsuite ocially became cash-–ow positive mid-2016, and its awaited IPO now seems likely for this coming year. According to numbers recently released by the province, the B.C. tech sec- tor now employs over 90,000 people—more than mining, oil and gas, and forestry combined. All of this activity can also be seen as part of a bigger plan, which is to expand the economic ties and coordination between Seattle and Vancouver. Separated by a snarled freeway and a plugged-up international border, the cousin cities have long attracted the attention of local planners seeking to bring their communities closer together. In September we got an emblem of that in the form of B.C. Premier Christy Clark's and Washington Governor Jay Inslee's signatures on an agree- ment to coordinate economic development of the technolo¢y sectors in both places. The motive for American companies is clear. Canada has a speedier immigration environ- ment than does the U.S. That's important in a sector with a seemingly insatiable demand for engineers, many of whom are being schooled at the tech-friendly educational institutions of China and India. Getting them into Canada, by some estimates, takes less than half the time required to get them into the States. Butter•eld himself antici- pates close to 40 new hires in Vancouver, including in "cus- tomer experience" and front-end engineering. "Engineering is the second-biggest team here," he says. "And this is where most of the design leadership is, the core of the front-end develop- ment team. So my focus in Vancouver is on product and design, whereas in San Francisco it's more on investors and execu- tive recruiting." Executive recruiting may be easier in the San Francisco area because there would be much greater depth in people with experience in enterprise software companies in the •rst place. But it may also be easier because of the housing demands of people being hired at the most senior levels. Sure, a younger workforce—Butter•eld looked to be the only person over 40 in the Hamilton Street facility—may be willing to live in small or shared quarters in what is widely con- sidered one of the least a¥ord- able cities in the world. If you're looking to hire senior people, on the other hand, who will likely be older and may well have families, then you need to have places for them to live that don't cost millions of dollars. But maybe real estate prices are, in the end, a red herring. San Francisco and New York, both thriving tech hubs, have more expensive downtown real estate than Vancouver. The risk factor for the Vancouver tech boom may come down to a piece of paper: the U.S. H1§B visa. A non-immigration work permit allowing U.S. compa- nies to hire foreign nationals in specialized sectors including technolo¢y, the H1§B is capped at 65,000 persons annually. Were that head cap to be lifted, as it is rumoured it might be, a key Vancouver competitive advantage would fall away. And then the Slack-indicated tech boom might well be in jeopardy. Butter•eld isn't worrying about that—not at the moment, anyway. 2017 is coming, and he thinks Slack's drawing power will be ample to attract the people he needs. "Just look at how beautiful our oce is!" he exclaims. Then, more seriously, he o¥ers the following progno- sis: "I think that being at Slack right now will be similar to having worked at Google from 2005 to 2007, or Facebook from 2007 to 2009, or Apple in the mid 2000s." If he's right, a lot of people will be having a happy New Year. TECH BOOM AT A GLANCE That's how many people have tried to solve their way out of one of Exit Canada's 11 "escape room" locations since founder Justin Tang opened North America's rst, in Richmond, in 2013. Tang, who has seen nine competitors crop up in Richmond alone in the three years since opening, says he expects to get even busier by the new year as winter sets in and the indoor adventure industry hits high season for corporate team-building. Tang says escape rooms have become a go-to for company outings because, unlike paintball or laser tag, participants work together toward a common goal—and managers can watch how each individual performs. "Because they are so separated from the real world, their true personality comes out," he says. "You can actually see who has the material to be a leader, who blames others, and who doesn't do so much." by Melissa Edwards 231,000 Lock 'Em Up NUMEROLOGY SOURCE: BC STATS / BRITISH COLUMBIA TECHNOLOGY REPORT CARD, KPMG, OCTOBER 2016 The B.C. tech- nology sector comprises over 9,500 companies Generates over $15 billion in GDP Has annual revenues of $26 billion And employs 92,700