Robots to drones: B.C. puts focus on tech into hyperdrive with first-ever summit
VANCOUVER — Greg Caws calls home a cattle ranch in the East Kootenay community of Wardner and says he appreciates the perspective of rural British Columbia, where relatives have worked as miners and loggers.
He’s also an entrepreneur who champions the technology sector with unsung stories of companies marrying those traditional industries with cutting-edge innovations.
There are drones being designed in Nelson for prospectors, a robotic drilling rig that walks north of Fort St. John, and a tiny camera developed in Vancouver that can descend down a borehole for kilometres.
“Every time you hear the bogeyman stories about, ‘Oh, our jobs are going to be taken,’ it never happens,” said Caws, president of the B.C. Innovation Council, explaining that work conventionally done by hands is instead moving to heads.