E-Commerce: Discover Innovative Canadian Capabilities

Interested in E-Commerce? Think Canada!

Information, goods, money and services now race around the globe with breathtaking speed and efficiency. No other country offers a more stimulating and supportive environment for e-commerce than Canada. No other country can match Canada as a supplier of skills and equipment to make e-commerce work.

Canada's E-Commerce Skills Export Easily

Canada's e-commerce strength lies in the diversity of its products and services. Over 1000 companies are already handling the technological demands of business and government. Why not put Canada's expertise to work for you? Canada's world-leading information and communications technology (ICT) companies can give your firm a strong base for its e-commerce endeavours. The same companies that built Canada's e-commerce infrastructure can replicate their efforts anywhere in the world. Whatever your needs, Canadian companies can meet them.

Dynamic, Competitive, Business-Friendly - Canada Is the Place for E-Commerce

The federal government is working closely with the private sector to ensure that Canada has the best conditions anywhere for e-commerce. And Canadian companies are helping others around the world take advantage of the e-commerce revolution.

• Entrust Technologies dominates the market in Internet security technology. It is the world's largest provider of Certification Authority and Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) cryptographic software, and is internationally recognized for the excellence of its research and development facility in Ottawa, Ontario. It was selected to provide the People's Bank of China with industry-leading PKI software and services for the bank's secure Web authentication projects - the largest secure e-commerce infrastructure effort ever undertaken in China.
• CGI, headquartered in Montréal, Quebec, is the largest independent Canadian information technology consulting firm and the fifth largest in North America. CGI provides end-to-end information technology services and business solutions to more than 3000 clients in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, France, India, Japan and Australia. CGI offers "single-window" e-government service-delivery solutions to local authorities in Scotland, England and Wales. CGI has also contracted with If Skadeförsäkring, the Nordic insurance company, to implement its new Web-enabled insurance solution across all of If Skadeförsäkring's 86 offices in the Nordic region.
• Burntsand, with corporate headquarters in Toronto, Ontario, is a thriving e-business solutions integrator with a 2000-firm client list. Focusing on the growing business-to-business environment, their services encompass the strategic, technical and creative aspects of e-commerce. Burntsand undertook an infrastructure consolidation project in the U.K. for a large insurance company that serves over 10 million globally, and was the integrator in the installation and activation of the first automated energy-trading exchange in Britain for the European Common Market. Other international clients are based in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan and Australia.

Canada Sets the Stage for E-Commerce Growth

Canada enjoys a world-leading e-commerce environment, with many policy firsts that are particularly important to companies that want to make e-commerce part of their success.

• Canada is building trust and confidence in e-commerce. Sound policies address cryptography, authentication and the protection of privacy. A set of principles and guidelines has protected on-line Canadian consumers since 1999.
• Canada has removed barriers to e-commerce by updating marketplace rules in key legal, policy and framework areas.
• Digital signatures and electronic documents are formally recognized in Canadian law.
• Canada has a "technology-neutral" approach to e-commerce taxation and no Internet-specific taxes.
• Canada's information infrastructure is world class. Policies have already been put in place for Internet governance, standards and government-wide Public Key Infrastructure.

E-Commerce Growth in the World's Best-Connected Environment

Canada has a determined policy goal of becoming the most "connected" country in the world. Canada is poised to achieve its connectedness targets, and our welcoming e-commerce environment is ripe for investment:

• Canada is first among G-7 countries in the share of population that uses the Internet, and second in number of computers per capita.
• Canada is the first nation in the world to connect all its schools and libraries, and the 4200 public sites of our Community Access Program offer free or affordable access to the Internet.
• Through our Government On-Line initiative, Canadians will enjoy one-stop, real-time electronic shopping for all government services and information by 2005.
• Canada's advanced Internet development organization (CANARIE) and a private-sector consortium have launched the world's first national R&D high-speed optical network.
• Canada's first-rate, wired banking system offers ironclad protection and rapid movement of funds. Canadian banks are highly attuned to e-commerce needs.

Think Bottom Line, Think Canada - And Canadian E-Commerce Solutions!

Forecasts hold that the Canadian Internet economy could grow from $28 billion in 1998 to $155 billion by 2003. A survey of Canadian business leaders found an average actual return on e-commerce investment of 18.4 percent, with expectations of a 42 percent return.

Internationally, Canada's leadership is growing rapidly. The world is learning that Canadian know-how can help create the conditions for e-commerce success, and that Canadian companies are ready, willing and able to export their skills and products. Your company can benefit from Canadian expertise, no matter where you are in the world.

Get the e-commerce information to get you started by visiting the Government of Canada's Electronic Commerce in Canada Web site (http://ecom.ic.gc.ca/).