Submission by Real Time Medical

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The following documents contain the written submissions received by the Competition Bureau in response to its market study notice, which was issued on April 8, 2021. All submissions received as part of this consultation exercise are available to the public, except where confidentiality is specifically requested.

Submitted by: Real Time Medical

Canada needs to make it possible for SMEs to do projects at scale. The perception of SMEs in the digital health space is that Canada is "A land of the giants" where despite the programs that the federal government has established around innovation it is the large companies that continue to receive opportunities at scale. SME companies are stymied as significant projects are offered only to the giants. Consortiums are fine, as an example US department of homeland securities has made procurement to involve SMEs, in other words, the big boys can't come to play unless they involve the small guys.

If Canada is serious about fostering innovation, SME's need the ability to deploy at scale - to large companies, to provinces, to large networks. The risk that would be taken in supporting SMEs can be offset with a consortium. It means small companies can't deploy globally. Governments and large scale entities in other jurisdiction expect that companies have deployed at scale. They want to know where the technology has been deployed at scale.

The implicit message is that if the domestic market doesn't trust the company, its impossible for other jurisdictions to trust them.