Province providing Composites Innovation Centre with $2.88-M in funding

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This article was published 04/06/2014 (4378 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Manitoba government is maintaining its support of the Composites Innovation Centre with a $2.88-million funding commitment for the next two years.

Since its establishment in 2003 the CIC has developed into Canada’s largest composite technology centre. It has initiated 346 projects with 119 industry partners and 40 government agencies. Among other things the CIC supported the development of new advanced commercial jet aircraft at Boeing Winnipeg including the new 787 Dreamliner and other advanced composite projects that created 500 jobs.

Provincial support for CIC will include $2.73 million over two years to renew realizing a vision for composites manufacturing in Manitoba. The province will also invest $157,000 over two years from the Manitoba Research and Innovation Fund for a CIC Bio-composite Design Theory Development project. That project is in collaboration with the Cooperative Research Centre – Advanced Composite Structures (CRS-ACS) in Queensland, Australia.

Since 2003, the province has contributed more than $10.8 million to the CIC.

Composite materials are made by embedding strong and light strands of material, such as glass fibres or carbon threads, in a plastic material such as resin. When cured, the final product is strong and lightweight. Composites replace metal parts to reduce weight and save energy, reduce the number of parts needed and lower assembly costs.

The CIC is also on the leading edge of developing bio-composites, incorporating natural fibres from locally grown crops like flax and hemp, to create a potentially renewable source of industrial-grade parts for all sorts of manufacturing applications.