What would happen if, overnight, Canada suddenly lost all access to American tech?
That question was posed by our friends at the Canadian Shield Institute, who have put together an infographic outlining what the average day might look like without the economic and technological integration Canadians have come to expect—maybe even depend on.
“When we talk about sovereignty, we’re talking about strategic capacity. Can you govern yourself with the tools that you have?”
You can play with the infographic yourself, but the TL;DR is not great: while there are some viable Canadian alternatives, our country just doesn’t have a complete ‘sovereign tech stack.’ It’s part of the reason why our 2026 BetaKit Most Ambitious issue, which tells stories of Canadian innovators strengthening our security, autonomy, and prosperity, has an entire section dedicated to the companies trying to fill those gaps.
In that section, we also have an op-ed from Canadian Shield Institute managing director, Vass Bednar, asking another important question: how sovereign is sovereign enough? Do we really need a Canadian version of every app or service or technology, or is there a better way?
This week on the podcast, Vass joins to answer that question and a whole bunch of others, like what does minimum viable sovereignty for Canadian tech look like? How should we evaluate recent ‘elbows up’ federal policy initiatives? And maybe the biggest question of all: what does sovereignty really mean for Canadians in an ever more interconnected digital world?
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The answers might be as tough to parse as the questions, but Vass is an apex-level policy wonk and has an incredible way of explaining complex subjects so that Canadians can engage with them.
So let’s do that! Let’s engage. Let’s… dig in.
PRESENTED BY
The BetaKit Podcast is presented by BetaKit Most Ambitious.
Amid global uncertainty, the path forward is clear: Canada’s moment to build is now.
Presented by Uber Canada, DMZ, and National Bank of Canada, BetaKit Most Ambitious is back, telling stories of nearly 100 Canadian innovators strengthening our nation’s autonomy, security, and prosperity.
Read BetaKit Most Ambitious now.
Recorded and edited by Toronto Podcasts.