Tech Roundup
March 10, 2026

Headlines

• The Community Safety and Wellness Accelerator is wrapping up after six cohorts supporting 110 companies worldwide in building safer, healthier communities. "While this program concludes, the movement does not," the organization posted. "The work continues through each founder, each venture, and each supporter who believes that community safety and wellness deserve bold solutions."
• Entrepreneurs involved in defence and dual-use technology recommend that other founders start conversations early and stay true to their mission if they see an opportunity. Callie Lissinna of Wyvern, James Neufeld of Samdesk, and Christopher Cassin of Zero Point Cryogenics discussed the future of defence technology as part of an update on the MIT REAP Edmonton initiative at Edmonton Unlimited on March 3.
• The University of Alberta profiled Aqua-Cell Energy co-founder Keith Cleland, who is using an Innovation Catalyst Grant fellowship to scale up a saltwater battery made from abundant, non-toxic materials to store low-cost solar and wind power for peak grid hours.
• Levven has launched a major refresh of its Controls app, featuring a redesigned interface, smarter navigation, and improved home status visibility and device setup.
• Caldera Interactive has published a trailer for The Rabbit Haul and plans to release the game on Steam on March 18.
• Diesel Tech Industries COO Rebecca Goldsack and the City of Edmonton's fleet director Heidi Hicks joined the Hydrogen 2.0 podcast episode to discuss the lessons and challenges of deploying hydrogen in Edmonton's municipal fleets.
• Emissions Reduction Alberta is distributing nearly $46 million to nine oil sands projects focused on mine water and tailings management through its Tailings Technology Challenge, with the investments expected to support hundreds of jobs and $220 million in GDP by 2027. Keepers of the Water, a non-profit organization formed by Elders from northern First Nations communities, said the announcement represents "a very small drop into a 1.7-trillion litre bucket, and not a serious attempt to clean up an industry with billions of dollars of toxic liabilities sitting on its balance sheets."
• Capital Power CEO Avik Dey told analysts he is "more excited today than I've been at any other point in time" about opportunities to power data centres in Alberta, calling the company's Genesee Generating Station west of Edmonton "probably one of the most attractive generation sites anywhere in North America" for a potential data centre partner. The company also declared a quarterly dividend of $0.6910 per share on its common shares for the quarter ending March 31, and recently renewed an agreement with the City of Edmonton to keep either a Canadian or global head office in the city for at least 10 years, among other commitments.
• The University of Alberta has formed a partnership with Tohoku University in Japan to grow international opportunities for research in sustainable energy, technology, business, and more.
• Christine Spottiswood has taken over as executive director of the Northern Alberta Business Incubator in St. Albert, replacing Rajesh Jaiswal, who had led the organization since 2020.
• Innovation strategist Shawn Kanungo joined the Table Talk podcast from the Alberta Business Family Institute for a conversation about disruption, the "AI paradox" in family enterprise, and how AI agents are shifting work from planning to execution.
• Alicia Fowler, founder of MOD Accounting and Rayo Teams, was a guest on the Women in Leadership and Entrepreneurship podcast from Dentons Edmonton, where she talked about building a values-aligned, women-led accounting practice grounded in feminist leadership.
• CBC Radio's Daybreak Alberta has launched a bi-monthly segment on AI with Matthew Guzdial of the Alberta Machine Intelligence Institute as a regular guide.
• NorQuest College has reinvented its annual career fair for the AI era, adding a LinkedIn optimization lab with interactive resume games, professional headshots, and a business attire corner alongside 52 traditional employer booths. The fair drew more than 2,500 attendees.
• The Edmonton Police Service's financial crimes unit kicked off Fraud Prevention Month on March 4 at the Central Lions Seniors Recreation Centre, warning about the growing threat of AI-powered scams. Edmontonians lost $58 million to fraud in 2025, primarily to investment schemes, according to the police service, but only 5% to 15% of incidents are reported.

Jobs and opportunities

• The Alberta government is hiring a program coordinator in the Ministry of Technology and Innovation.
• Deloitte is hiring an AI developer in its Edmonton office.
• The Alberta Machine Intelligence Institute is hiring a machine learning scientist.
• SPARK Alberta, powered by the University of Calgary's Hunter Hub for Entrepreneurial Thinking, is accepting spring 2026 applications until March 29 from faculty, researchers, and graduate students at Alberta post-secondary institutions with digital health innovations.

Happenings

Here are some events coming up over the next seven days:

• March 11: Meet and Greet with Mayor and Council starting at 7:30am at Edmonton Unlimited
• March 11: Community Coffee Takeover: Levven Electronics starting at 9am at Edmonton Unlimited
• March 11: Capital Access & Women Founders: Progress, Gaps, and What's Next starting at 12pm online
• March 11: Open Data Day starting at 2:30pm at Edmonton Public Library (Stanley A. Milner)
• March 12: ERIN x Technology Alberta - Pi(e) Day Meet-Up starting at 4pm at Edmonton Research Park
• March 16: New Member Monday starting at 10am online

And here are some upcoming events to keep in mind:

• March 18: Venture Pilots: Built World Tech Showcase at Edmonton Unlimited
• March 19: Edmonton Region Research and Commercialization Day starting at 8:30am at Edmonton Unlimited
• March 19: Smarter Property Workflows with Caret starting at 11:30am at EPCOR Tower

Visit the Taproot Edmonton Calendar for many more events in the Edmonton region.

Beyond Edmonton

• Alberta Technology and Innovation Minister Nate Glubish pitched Alberta's natural gas, low taxes, and cool climate for data centre investment at the Digital Innovation Forum in Calgary, arguing domestic compute infrastructure is essential for digital sovereignty as global data centre demand is expected to triple by 2030.