Medicom to open new Montreal subsidiary to produce raw material for PPE
Canadian Plastics
Canadian Plastics COVID-19The manufacturing subsidiary, which is receiving federal government funding, is part of a strategy to provide Canada with domestic production of this meltblown polypropylene filter.
Quebec-based Medicom Group Inc., a manufacturer of surgical and respiratory masks, has created a new manufacturing subsidiary for the production and innovation of the inner filter material used in the manufacture of surgical, pediatric, and N95-type respiratory masks.
Called Meltech Innovation Canada Inc., the subsidiary will operate from a new plant in the greater Montreal area and will create at least 21 new jobs and 16 new co-op positions for university students. The Government of Canada has also committed to investing up to $28.99 million through the Strategic Innovation Fund, towards the nearly $39 million investment required.
The goal, the government said in a news release, is to help ensure that Canada will no longer be the only OECD-country that does not have domestic production of this meltblown polypropylene filter.
“We are investing to ensure we can produce critical PPE here in Canada,” François-Philippe Champagne, Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry, said in a news release. “[This] investment in Meltech is an important step toward improving Canada’s resilience and pandemic preparedness…[and] will ensure that Canadian frontline healthcare workers continue to have a reliable supply of the critical PPE they need, while creating good jobs here in Montreal.”
“Establishing this new plant that will produce the raw material required for surgical and respiratory masks will help to ensure that Canada never again experiences the PPE shortages we did in March 2020 when the global supply chain was under extreme strain,” said Medicom founder and CEO Ronald Reuben. “Thanks to this partnership with the Government of Canada, Meltech will initially produce the filter material needed to manufacture the equivalent of tens of millions masks right here in Canada, with more capacity planned.”
Connected to this plant, Medicom will establish a new research and development centre to drive innovation in PPE. “The new PPE R&D centre, based in Quebec, will be unique in Canada,” said Medicom chief operating officer Guillaume Laverdure. “Combining our own expertise developed over the past thirty years in Canada, the United States, Europe and Asia with various industrial and academic partners, we are aiming to become a world leader in medical innovation. We are even more pleased to be doing this from our home base in Quebec.”
Medicom has operations in over 50 countries.
