Enterprise Square ready to thrive

Now that the work is done and the last of the lights have been turned on, the U of A's long-awaited downtown campus at Enterprise Square is ready to thrive. Its official opening will be held Jan. 15.

Loose construction ends are expected to be tied up until the summer, but all of Enterprise Square's major tenants have moved across the river and are settling into their new confines, including TEC Edmonton, which took over all 48,000 sq. ft. of the building's fourth floor just before Christmas. Other occupants include the Faculty of Extension, Alumni Affairs, Advancement Services and Development.

TEC Edmonton, a venture capital partnership between the university and the City of Edmonton to incubate and grow new technology companies, moves into a mix of labs and office space with hopes of spawning a flurry of technology success stories.

And although TEC Edmonton's business experts have been physically separated from campus, TEC Edmonton CEO David Cox says the benefits of being downtown far outweigh any separation anxiety.

"So how we are dealing with that is basically how we've always dealt with it - we go out to the scientists and the deans and the department heads, we don't ask them to come to us," said Cox, adding the campus is just an LRT ride away. "The upside is we're now in the heart of the business community. The lawyers, the accountants, the service providers of all sorts, the investment community, they're all here."

And in the increasingly crowded world of investment, nothing beats a downtown address, says Cox. "If a company has a University of Alberta campus address then it has some cachet, but it is much more convenient for investors and persuasive for investors to see that the organization has been established in a place like this."

With receipts still being tallied, the estimated price tag is hovering around the $86.5 million mark, with money kicked in from all levels of government including $15 million from the Government of Canada, $15 million from the Alberta government and $7.5 from the City of Edmonton. In comparison, the Bay building was originally completed in 1939 for the then-unthinkable sum of $1 million.