10 Winnipeg companies place on Globe and Mail list

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This article was published 27/09/2024 (420 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Activate Games, Boyd Group Services and eight other Winnipeg-based companies made the Globe and Mail’s 2024 list of “top growing companies.”

Activate Games — an interactive gaming chain that’s expanding into Europe and the Middle East — ranked No. 38, marking Winnipeg’s highest showing.

The company’s revenue last year was placed in the $10 million to $25 million range; it has 278 employees. This year cemented Activate’s first time on the Globe and Mail’s annual ranking.

Conquest Planning, a financial software company, was No. 51. The Private Network, labelled a consolidator of managed IT services companies in Western Canada, was No. 83.

Genuine Comfort and Highway Motor Freight represented Winnipeg at Nos. 122 and 186, respectively. National Sales, Wellington-Altus Financial, Clear Concepts Inc., Boyd Group Services and BCV Asset Management also made the cut.

Boyd Group’s listing shows its revenue exceeded $1 billion last year.

Neo Financial topped the 2024 list. It has an office in Winnipeg; several former employees have recently shared their stories of layoffs and an alleged toxic work culture with the Free Press.

The Globe highlighted 416 companies in its list this year.

Manitoba joins trucking industry pilot project

Manitoba has joined a nation-wide pilot project to change trucking practices.

Ten provinces and territories will mutually recognize the various trucking sectors’ regulatory requirements. Ottawa cabinet ministers tout the move as a way to reduce internal trade barriers.

The pilot is the first of its kind within Canada. It’s an initial step towards wider, national adoption of mutual recognition, a federal government news release reads.

Ontario, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, Saskatchewan, Alberta, Newfoundland and Labrador, the Northwest Territories, Yukon and Nunavut have also signed on to the test initiative.

Mutual recognition could increase Canada’s economy by $200 billion per year, the new release reads.

More than $500 billion worth of goods and services cross provincial and territorial borders. In 2023, one-third of Canadian businesses bought and sold goods across borders.

Ninety-five per cent of goods moved within Manitoba depend on trucks, according to Manitoba Trucking Association data.

The mutual recognition could, for example, allow a truck to cross a border even if its oversized vehicle signage doesn’t align with requirements of the province it’s entering. Safety and security measures won’t be compromised, the feds underscored.

The Canadian Federation of Independent Business applauded the pilot project, saying mutual recognition reduces red tape, lowers costs and increases competitiveness for small businesses.

— Free Press staff