Windsor-Essex: Your Bridge to the Future
Video Link: Cross into Canada’s Innovation Hub
Background: Windsor-Essex is located in the heart of Canada’s innovation corridor and has a diverse range of industry strengths including automobility, zero-emission and clean technology, information and communications technologies, advanced manufacturing and life sciences. With many business incentives, great entrepreneurial supports and employment services, Windsor-Essex is a great place for companies to start, operate and grow.
As part of a targeted campaign to attract foreign direct investment, Invest WindsorEssex created a video exhibiting the region’s advantageous location as a border city, diverse and bi-national talent pipeline and the opportunities available within our vastly growing innovation and technology sector.
Building on the region’s rich history in the development and production of the automobile, this video showcases Windsor-Essex as a leader in automotive technology and beyond, including the development and production of connected, autonomous and electric vehicles (EVs). Windsor-Essex has transitioned from the ‘Automotive Capital of Canada’ to the ‘Automobility Capital of Canada’ and an innovation hub for emerging technologies and sustainable mobility solutions.
The primary objective for the video is to attract foreign direct investment from technology companies in the United States to expand business operations into the Windsor-Essex region by providing key regional content and captivating visuals:
- Quality of life: Our attractive region, low cost of living and multiple lifestyle amenities all contribute to the community being the ideal expansion destination.
- Thriving Innovation hub: Windsor-Essex is a global leader in innovation and technology with a thriving tech ecosystem and a world-class, diverse talent pool. The region is home to countless tech start-ups, Canada’s largest publicly accessible virtual reality (VR) CAVE and the Canadian Automobility Hub (Canada’s first EV ramp-up factory). Windsor-Essex is also the future home to the Stellantis and LG Energy Solution $5-billion gigafactory (North Star Energy – Canada’s first battery plant).
- Talent: The region is home to several major research facilities and world-renowned institutes of higher education, including the University of Windsor and St. Clair College.
- Proximity: One of the most obvious advantages of Windsor-Essex is location; bordering the United States at the heart of the richest consumer market in the world.
Target audience: Several interviews were conducted with key stakeholders and focus groups to gain a deeper understanding of emotional and rationale influences on decision-making and considerations in overcoming barriers to expand or locate to Windsor-Essex.
- Small and medium-sized tech-oriented business owners and operators.
- Titles: Chief Executive Officers, Chief Operations Officers, Vice Presidents, Business Development
- Key Sectors: Digital Tech, Automobility, Information Technology
- Geography: Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois
- Key Qualities: Innovative, Competitive, Connected
Effectiveness: Since the launch date (June 21, 2022) the video has received over 50,000 impressions and the overall targeted FDI campaign has secured 100s of high-quality leads. Total campaign impressions to date equals 350,000 across all digital media platforms.
Main challenge: The technology sector is rapidly growing across the nation and beyond and has become highly competitive with each region claiming to be on the forefront of future development and research. To properly showcase Windsor-Essex as a global innovation leader and tech incubator, it was critical to differentiate through identifying the region’s unique attributes (i.e. busiest commercial border crossing between Canada and the United States), rich history in automotive and mobility technology and recent investments in the automobility space (i.e. NorthStar Energy).
