November 30, 2009

Business development

Online export directory helps construction companies improve international profiles

VINCE VERSACE

staff writer

Canadian construction companies looking to improve their international profiles now have a key tool available at their fingertips: a national online construction export directory.

“This directory is meant to be an external tool to really create that overall Canadian supply chain brand, from end-to-end, of all that is available from an export and investment perspective,” says Marie-Claude Erian, sector advisor, infrastructure and environment at Export Development Canada (EDC).

“The more robust it becomes, the more successful it is and the more we can add to it. We will invest in it if the private sector is also investing their time and finding it valuable to them.”

EDC and the Canadian Construction Association (CAA) recently launched the Canadian Construction Exports Directory after jointly developing it. The directory aims to aid construction companies in profiling themselves on the international scene while facilitating matches between Canadian capabilities and interests with international opportunities

“This will be a great tool. It is always hard for someone to profile themselves at the international level readily and in an effective manner,” says Pierre Boucher, chief operating officer at CCA.

“This is a live document where companies can change their profile on an ongoing basis, adding expertise, experience, awards and recognition that they may accomplish.

It allows people to quickly identify each other and start an exchange of information.”

Besides company profiles, the directory will soon also contain procurement links, project announcements and will be able to send registered companies alerts of project opportunities that match their profile. There will also be links to data about risk evaluation, financial solutions and business contacts, notes Erian.

“It is now up to the companies to populate the database and engage in it,” she says. “The more robust it is, the more we can really promote it and feel comfortable reaching out to buyers, all over the world, looking for suppliers of goods and services for their infrastructure and construction projects.”

To help build the critical database mass of between 300 to 400 companies in the directory, CCA has begun outreach to the chief operating officers of its member associations and its overall membership via its quarterly newsletter. Provincial construction associations, like Quebec, have begun profiling it already.

CCA also plans to meet with its partners at the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada and Association of Consulting Engineering Companies-Canada to promote the benefits for their engagement in the directory.

“We are constantly told by foreign companies and governments that Canadian construction should have a larger share of the world market,” explains Boucher.

“They want to work with us, they like Canadians, who we are and what we stand for, our ethics and that there’s a need for us. This helps them connect with our people.”

The three targeted users of the directory are EDC representatives with strategic relationships in key markets, Canada’s foreign affairs department and its trade commissionaires who have construction as priority and buyers and general contractors.

When Erian helped build an online exports directory for the Canadian plastics and packaging industry in early 2000, it took 12 to 18 months to become robust and then “the numbers were staggering” concerning use and traffic, she says.

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