Brewing Breakthroughs

It was an appreciated bit of free PR from one of Niagara College’s local partners: when DistillX Beverages founder Bob Huitema gave his pitch to investors on CBC’s Dragon’s Den, he gave a shoutout to the college. DistillX’s first-in-Canada zeroalcohol, zero-sugar, zero-hangover Søbrii Ø-Gin was developed in close cooperation with the college’s Food and Beverage Innovation Centre. The Dragons raved, and Huitema secured the $100,000 investment he was looking for.

It’s just one example of stellar work from Niagara College’s Research and Innovation Centres, whose goal is to help local small to medium-sized enterprises without their own R&D arms commercialize their products and scale up their businesses. Other successes include Orangevillebased Pilling Foods and Barrie’s Miski Brewing.

“Our goal is to help businesses spread their wings into the industry,” says David DiPietro, Niagara College Research and Innovation’s Manager of Business Development. The college was ranked Canada’s number one research college in 2023 for the second time, and its four research centres — Food and Beverage Innovation Centre, Horticultural and Environmental Sciences

Innovation Centre, Business and Commercialization Innovation Centre, and Walker Advanced Manufacturing Innovation Centre — help with everything from market research to prototyping to product development.

Products aren’t the only thing they’re developing. Lyndon Ashton points to a focus on economic, workforce, and talent development in Ontario and the Niagara region that underpins everything the college does. Ashton is Associate Director, Economic Development and Planning.

The college is also home to Canada’s first teaching winery, first teaching brewery, and first teaching distillery. “We’re driven by our local economy,” says DiPietro.

That’s clear looking at their work. The centres have worked on over 800 projects with industry partners since 2011, and NC Research and Innovation is always growing. DiPietro recently returned to the college from a stint elsewhere, and was stunned to see huge facility growth and a team multiplied threefold. The centres have an excellent reputation, he says, and word of mouth has worked in their favour.

“That was a wow moment for me,” he says. “We now have our own space on both campuses that’s completely dedicated to our labs. We have a brand-new research greenhouse that’s in the final stages of being developed.”

Relationships have been key to that growth. Since Huitema’s appearance on Dragon’s Den, DistillX has continued working with the Centre on new products. The partnership’s latest work includes ready-to-drink beverages like canned gin and tonics.

The college is proud of these successes and intends to keep making a difference.

“We have great people here doing great things,” says Ashton. “And we know it’s just going to keep growing.”

Interested in working with NC Research and Innovation? Visit www.ncinnovation.ca to learn more.