Immigration laws, talent pool entice San Jose company to set up R&D shop in Toronto

Smart antenna maker ArrayComm Inc has chosen Toronto as the site for its second North American R&D centre, saying the skilled workers it needs aren’t available in Silicon Valley. The nine-year-old company headed by CEO Martin Cooper, inventor of the modern cellular phone, held its grand opening at its new King Street location on March 23. It’s in the process of hiring 25 engineers to staff the facility, which is headed by former Toronto resident and interim director Athos Kasapi. "We have a very heavy recruiting effort underway," says Sam Endy, executive VP and GM of ArrayComm’s IntelliCell products group. "I’m hoping to have 25 people by the end of the year. I’d like to have 25 people tomorrow." The new recruits will specialize in signal processing, implementing smart antennas, DSP coding, as well as GSM and wideband CDMA interfaces. "Those are the areas where I expect to get additional customers out of Europe which will help me utilize resources here on the east coast." Compared to much of the U.S., Endy says Canada is a goldmine of engineering talent. Recent layoffs by such industry giants as Nortel Networks Corp is revitalizing the HR pipeline for companies like ArrayComm that are still in an expansion mode. "We’re taking advantage of the fact that Nortel is laying off, and that Lucent and Ericsson are in the area." The quality of Toronto’s universities was another factor, for both its graduates and its professors. Endy says they’ve contracted professor Elvino Silveira Sousa – a wireless expert from the University of Toronto’s Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering – to work for ArrayComm one day a week. Canada’s liberal immigration laws also make it easier to bring in foreign workers than in the U.S. "Canada seems to have more liberal and flexible immigration rules for high tech people who want to work in Canada," says Endy. "For example, I could probably get someone from Sweden into Canada within a month under the rules." He adds that Toronto’s lower housing prices, compared to California, also make it easier to attract foreign workers. "So all of that makes this a very rich recruiting ground." Technology offers alternative to 3G broadband ArrayComm’s core technology is IntelliCell, a signal processing system for smart antennas. The technology is licensed to manufacturers for use in W-CDMA, GSM, PHS and WLL networks. Its newest product to use Intellicell technology is i-BURST, a portable, broadband access system that offers data rates of 40 Mbps via laptops, palmtops and next-generation Internet appliances. The technology also increases the number of subscribers that can use the same bit of spectrum. A commercial trial of i-BURST is scheduled for later this year in San Diego, using experimental frequencies assigned by the Federal Communications Commission.Endy says the technology can provide ubiquitous access to high speed Internet access. "In the Toronto market, for example, it could provide complete coverage of the Toronto area, such that where ever you wanted to take your device, you could click it on, power it up, and bing you’re on the Internet." Toronto centre to conduct client specific work The new Toronto lab will work on a GSM product for one of ArrayComm’s customers in Melbourne Florida. "He’s building a software GSM radio, and he needs smart antennas," explains Endy. "We do the research, the development, the engineering, the integration with the customer and participate heavily in the field testing." Investors in ArrayComm include Britan’s Marconi Plc, which last month invested an undisclosed amount to acquire a less than 10 per cent stake. Another investor, Sony Corp of America, plans to bring content and gaming to the partnership.

Immigration laws, talent pool entice San Jose company to set up R&D shop in Toronto

News | 04/03/2001 4:00 am EDT

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