With its long history and glorious industrial past, Trois-Rivières is increasingly turning to innovation and start-ups. “It was therefore important to ensure that Trois-Rivières’ cultural and tourism milieu was innovative,” explains Daniel Rioux, tourism coordinator at Innovation et Développement économique Trois-Rivières, and one of 12 major MT Lab partners. I propose to share their experience with you for inspiration.
To channel this wind of dynamism blowing through the city of Trois-Rivières, a partnership has been set up between three major structures: Innovation et Développement économique Trois-Rivières, Culture Trois-Rivières and the Corporation des événements de Trois-Rivières. ” Together, these organizations are determined to equip themselves with additional tools for development,” explains Daniel Rioux.
Their partnership with MT Lab has enabled new ideas to emerge, despite the pandemic. Their recipe for attracting entrepreneurs? The municipality offers its downtown area to startups looking to test new projects.
It’s easy to close a street here,” continues Daniel Rioux. If a company wants to try out an idea or develop a project, we’re very agile.” Trois-Rivières wants to share this complicity with MT Lab start-ups with all the innovative companies on the planet. We’re one of the most innovative regions in Quebec,” he adds proudly. We’re the only territory to work with MT Lab, in addition to Montreal.”
As soon as MT Lab opened in 2017, the city of Trois-Rivières saw it as a unique development opportunity. “We wanted to get on board with MT Lab even before it opened,” he confides. After numerous exchanges, Trois-Rivières signed a 3-year contract with MT Lab in 2020, opening the doors to the incubator and its network of start-ups, both here and internationally. A good way of following the emergence of innovations and testing them first.
Isabelle Lopez, founder and CEO of MySmartJourney, can testify to this. “Culture Trois-Rivières had spotted us before we’d even finished producing our platform,” explains the young entrepreneur. In 2018, we were approached during an MT Lab tour in Trois-Rivières. The Boralis Museum team immediately adopted our product to carry out a murder mystery activity.” MySmartJourney is a system for communicating in public places to tell stories, describe the environment or broadcast specific content. “Our library of pre-programmed features is easily used to quickly create and parameterize sophisticated scenarios for any type of project,” continues Isabelle. Our platform is flexible and allows us to adapt to different ideas.”
Culture Trois-Rivières was a key customer for MySmartJourney. ” It was one of our first customers. It enabled us to test and validate our platform, adjust and improve our product,” recalls Isabelle Lopez. The Culture Trois-Rivières team challenged us and came up with several new ideas.” Since then, MySmartJourney has deployed its solution as far afield as Le Mans, France, last autumn, where it is used at information points throughout the city.
Isabelle Lopez emphasizes that innovation is part of the Trois-Rivières culture: “What strikes me most is the extent to which their organizations coordinate with each other. They work around common projects, even when it’s pure experimentation.”
At Trois-Rivières, we’re a bit like mentors,” concludes Daniel Rioux. We work for ourselves, but also for others. We’re here to help startups, just as they help us innovate.”
Creating space to attract opportunities is the secret of an innovative Trois-Rivières.
Originally published on Tourisme Express on January 31, 2022
