Varcoe: Alberta tech sector watching for 'worrisome' immigration changes following referendum

Helcim CEO Nic Beique says it was clear that if Monday’s separation vote ended up supporting independence, he’d likely be looking to relocate the Calgary-based tech company — and is pleased that didn’t happen.

Three-quarters of Albertans voted to stay in Canada.

Yet, the leader of the Calgary-based online payments firm remains watchful for potential provincial changes tied to the immigration-related questions in the referendum.

The province’s high-tech sector, which has taken off in the past decade, relies on its ability to attract outside customers and investors — and talent to fill critical roles that can’t be met locally.

And it’s an industry that can operate virtually anywhere.

“It’s hugely important to attract people to Alberta. I mean, there’s great talent in Alberta, and we hire a ton of it. But we have world-class aspirations of the size of company we want to build,” Beique, whose company has 200 employees and is growing, said Wednesday.

“The ultimate thing that (the immigration issue) does is it sows doubt about how welcoming Alberta is to people from different places and different backgrounds.”

Across the tech sector and in other industries, business leaders said the clear-cut results in the referendum surrounding separation should remove any questions about the province’s future remaining firmly rooted within the country.

“The biggest thing was it’s good to have a decisive result on the primary question,” said Doug Schweitzer, CEO and co-founder of Calgary-based tech firm Ultimarii, and the province’s former technology minister.

“It was definitely on the minds of a lot of our team members.”

Some in the industry, like Beique, remain concerned about what the questions on immigration could mean for the ability to attract skilled workers from other provinces or countries.

Results as of late Wednesday show about 55 per cent of Albertans voted in favour of a question asking if the province should have more control over immigration “for the purposes of decreasing immigration levels to more sustainable levels” and to prioritize economic migration.

There was also a narrow 52 per cent majority on another question about charging fees to people with non-permanent immigration status tied to using Alberta’s health care and education systems.

“We are watching the immigration questions pretty carefully . . . given that they’re quite close, and not all the polls are reporting yet,” said Jess Sinclair, Prairies director for the Council of Canadian Innovators.

“Anything that sort of represents a compromise of Alberta’s ability to attract and retain skilled talent is worrisome.”

Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Premier Danielle Smith said she’s already had a conversation with Prime Minister Mark Carney about the two governments having a more collaborative approach, with Alberta assuming more control over immigration levels and economic migration, noting Quebec has had a similar agreement in place since the 1990s.

“We have something like 30,000 different applications for provincial nominee status (for permanent residency), and we know that we have an absolute need for a lot of the skilled professions,” Smith said.

“We’re going to need millwrights and electricians and plumbers and other journeymen . . . That’s the whole purpose of having a process where you can bring in and offer work permits and a pathway to citizenship.”

Nancy Knowlton, CEO of Calgary-based tech firm Nureva Inc., said the vote to stay in Canada will help remove uncertainty for the sector and people who might be considering moving to the province, “and that’s a positive thing to have that behind us.”

But there is some wariness about how the immigration questions might affect the sector’s ability to bring in skilled workers.

“Immigration has been a net benefit to us. So many of the people working with us are recent immigrants to Canada, so we’re very pro-immigration,” she said. “I would hate to see any stifling of that.”

Alberta’s tech sector has expanded rapidly in recent years, with several companies reaching “unicorn” status with billion-dollar valuations.

Calgary now has more than 80,000 people employed in the tech sector, according to a study released this summer by commercial real estate firm CBRE.

Between 2022 and 2025, Calgary recorded a 56 per cent jump in tech sector employment, posting the highest job growth rate — on a percentage basis — of all North American cities.

“We’ve got a huge base of technical talent here in Calgary. Some of it is a little more, perhaps, on the junior side,” said Jennifer Lussier, CEO of Platform Calgary.

“We have highly talented people coming in from all over the world.”

Jeff Adamson, co-founder and chief commercial officer of Neo Financial — one of Calgary’s tech unicorns — noted the city and province have several fundamental advantages needed to grow a business and attract workers, including a high quality of life, a strong economy and population growth.

And over the past two years, the fintech firm has been able to attract some of the best talent globally, including on the AI front, he said.

“Alberta has an extraordinary opportunity,” Adamson said.

“The one thing that unites everyone in Alberta is the opportunity to build.”

Chris Varcoe is a Calgary Herald columnist.

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