Some observers would say that Ottawa’s tech community has lost its “swagger.” Depending on who you talk to, that can be a good thing or a bad thing.
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When Nortel collapsed in 2009, it left a scar across a city that thought of itself as “Silicon Valley North.”
Almost two decades later, Ottawa is home to the greatest concentration of world-class tech companies per capita in North America, according to Invest Ottawa. And, the city boasts startups in everything from quantum computing and AI to health-tech and SaaS. Yet some observers would say that the tech community has lost its “swagger.”
Depending on who you talk to, that can be a good thing or a bad thing.
“We got so big and toyed with swagger, but then paid such a long price of hangover,” explains Ottawa tech executive Sacha Gera in an interview with Techopia. “I think it almost created a whole generation of conservatism.”
So what is swagger, and does Ottawa’s tech sector need it?

