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Mississauga
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Mississauga
LEVERAGING PARTNERSHIPS
The efficacy of the City of Mississauga and
its EDO is reflected in the city’s thriving and
diverse business community. The city currently
has over 63,000 businesses, including 73 For-
tune 500s, and 14,000 multinationals – most
of which are clustered around four key sectors
that the city specialises in and draws foreign
investment into.
These four sectors include life sciences, ad-
vanced manufacturing, information and com-
munications technology (ICT), and finance, in-
surance, and real estate (also known as FIRE).
This depth of existing business is important,
because companies tend to want to be located
near potential suppliers, distributors, and other
allied service providers in order to create syn-
ergies and efficiencies.
In addition to focusing on its existing
strengths, the City of Mississauga is also con-
stantly searching for new opportunities to de-
velop their economy and achieve their long-
term vision. To this end, they have initiated a
number of exciting infrastructure and econom-
ic development projects that will grow the city’s
appeal as a destination to live and work.
Some of these projects involve the city’s
transportation network and have received
funding from the Ontario provincial govern-
ment. An example is the Mississauga Transit-
way, a bus rapid transit system (BRT) that is
in the latter stages of construction. That proj-
ect involves the creation of 12 stations along
a dedicated transitway spanning east-to-west
from Meadowvale to the Mississauga Airport
Corporate Centre.
Another example is the Hurontario Light
Rail Transit (LRT), a planned light rail line that
will span 20 kilometres and 22 stops. Last
year, the provincial government announced
they will fully fund the project at roughly $1.4
billion. Construction on that project is expected
to commence in 2018, and the line is projected
to enter service in 2022.
“That’s going to be a huge game changer,
completely transformational for our city,” May-
or Crombie says.
The provincial government also partially
funded the completion of the GO Bus Terminal
in downtown Mississauga, which is the second
busiest in the GTA. More recently, the govern-
ment announced $20 million in grants to help
create a network of public charging stations
of electric vehicles, and a Mississauga-based
company earned the contract.
The City of Mississauga is also working
closely with other partners to create economic
development opportunities. For example, at
the University of Toronto Mississauga (UTM)
campus is I-CUBE, a business accelerator. I-
CUBE offers students and community youth
early-stage business development and com-
mercialization services – including an entre-
preneurial curriculum, business advisory ser-
vices, collaborative space, expert speaker
sessions, and a mentorship program. The city
is also home to another business incubator
in the RIC Centre, which provides services to
technology start-ups of all shapes and sizes in
Mississauga, Brampton and Caledon.
Mississauga is also part of a public-private
alliance that brings together 29 municipalities
and regions in the Greater Toronto Area, the