Industrial Research Unit · Straits Institute for Applied AI
Applied AI in Canada
Canada's AI sits in its banks and its city halls — the first enterprise-wide agentic workspace in Canadian banking, 17,000 Calgary intersections scored for pedestrian risk — under the second phase of the Pan-Canadian AI Strategy.
AI readiness
0.71
Rank 20 of 171 — IMF AI Preparedness Index
On the record
94
entries across 13 industries
National programme
2022
Pan-Canadian Artificial Intelligence Strategy, second phase — C$443m
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Services 64.1% · Industry 27.4% · Agriculture 1.9% of gross value added — World Bank, 2022
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Calgary has scored 17,000 intersections for pedestrian risk, and Toronto police have put AI plate readers across the force.
Evidence of impactGovernment & Public SectorCanada22 Oct 2026
Ottawa's GCtranslate AI tool mistranslated terms and swapped names
Translation Bureau (Public Services and Procurement Canada) — GCtranslate (GCtraduction), Ottawa's AI translation tool, erred repeatedly over its first six months, a Public Services and Procurement Canada file Radio-Canada obtained shows. 'TB' (Translation Bureau) came out as 'tuberculose', Mike turned into Stéphanie and 'indigenous' was at times given as 'indigène' instead of 'autochtone'; staff caught pre-launch 'should' and 'must' both becoming 'doit'. The minister's office called that span a pilot, said translators check output and models are retrained, counting over 725 million words of machine translation.
RegulationGovernment & Public SectorCanada20 Oct 2026
Canadian Judicial Council issues new AI and deepfake evidence guidelines for judges
Canadian Judicial Council — The Canadian Judicial Council has published updated AI guidelines for judges plus a new guide to weighing digital media evidence, deepfakes included. The 2026 edition urges the federal bench to harness AI for the administration of justice within judicial principles, with an appendix sorting appropriate, high-risk and inappropriate uses. Checklists in the companion guide cover acknowledged, unacknowledged and indirect AI evidence, completing the judicial AI guidance.
Evidence of adoptionGovernment & Public SectorCanada13 Oct 2026
Ottawa adds C$500 million to its Regional AI Initiative for business adoption
Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada — Ottawa has put a further C$500 million over five years into the Regional Artificial Intelligence Initiative, lifting federal backing to C$700 million. Evan Solomon, Minister of Artificial Intelligence and Digital Innovation, said Canada's regional development agencies will direct funds to AI adoption by businesses and towards helping Canadian AI firms commercialise and grow, prioritising robotics, manufacturing, agriculture, transportation, natural resources, energy, health and life sciences. Since 2024 the scheme has backed 218 adoption or commercialisation projects.
Evidence of adoptionGovernment & Public SectorCanada13 Oct 2026
Two-thirds of Canadian public servants now use AI, KPMG survey finds
KPMG in Canada — A KPMG in Canada poll of 519 federal, provincial and municipal staff puts AI use among public servants at 66 per cent, against 48 per cent the prior year. Ninety-four per cent deem guarding Canadian data and intellectual property pressing, while 76 per cent say purchasing rules steer buyers to homegrown AI suppliers whenever feasible.
DeploymentGovernment & Public SectorCanada9 Oct 2026
Halton police use AI simulations to hire and train 911 call takers
Halton Regional Police Service — Halton Regional Police Service in Ontario has adopted AI training for 911 call takers and dispatchers, calling itself the first Canadian agency with this type of technology. GovWorx, a US firm, supplies mock emergency calls testing recruits' decision-making, communication and crisis-management ability; police say evaluation time per candidate has dropped 50 per cent. The same system serves 911 communicator training and will later assess hired staff.
Evidence of impactGovernment & Public SectorCanada8 Oct 2026
McGill finds chatbots fed Quebec voters faulty election information
McGill University — Roughly 40% of Quebec voters asked AI chatbots about the election, and in the final three weeks 39% of ChatGPT's voting tips came from an amateur, error-strewn AI-built site, McGill University researchers told a federal parliamentary committee. Aengus Bridgman led the work; Taylor Owen of the Max Bell School of Public Policy testified.
RegulationGovernment & Public SectorCanada2 Oct 2026
Carney launches a National Council on AI to advise on Canada's AI transformation
Office of the Prime Minister of Canada — Prime Minister Mark Carney created a 13-member National Council on Artificial Intelligence for independent federal AI policy advice. Yoshua Bengio, Ajay Agrawal and fellow members will offer national AI guidance on strategy updates, faster adoption, national champions, sovereign AI infrastructure and government transformation; Patrick Pichette of the new Digital Transformation Canada agency sits ex officio.
Evidence of adoptionGovernment & Public SectorCanada24 Sep 2026
Canada and Manitoba fund applied-AI training for aerospace workers
Governments of Canada and Manitoba — Canada and Manitoba are funding the AeroTrace Workforce Pilot with $500,000, applied AI training for aerospace and manufacturing workers that also covers digital traceability and production data. Manitoba Aerospace and Defence will deliver the AI skills programme with mode40, a data firm, through the Canada-Manitoba Workforce Tariff Response Program.
DeploymentGovernment & Public SectorCanada15 Sep 2026
Cambridge lets builders pre-check designs with Archistar AI
City of Cambridge — The City of Cambridge has switched on two AI tools for development approvals aimed at faster home construction. Archistar tests a proposed scheme against municipal requirements before anyone files, and the Cambridge Digital Twin renders the city in three dimensions so planners, developers and residents can see what is proposed. Since September 1 builders, architects and homeowners can put designs and requirements through this AI planning check.
Evidence of adoptionGovernment & Public SectorCanada9 Sep 2026
Canada launches $13 million AI literacy drive for students and teachers
Government of Canada — The Government of Canada has begun a $13 million National AI Literacy Initiative with the Alberta Machine Intelligence Institute (Amii), aiming at as many as one million post-secondary students and 50,000-plus educators from kindergarten to Grade 12, Minister of Artificial Intelligence and Digital Innovation Evan Solomon announced. Institutions may sign up from 21 September, when an educators' course opens its first chapter; a version for all Canadians comes later this year.
RegulationGovernment & Public SectorCanada7 Sep 2026
Canada's refugee board bans AI-written evidence in its hearings
Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada — The Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada now applies a practice notice on AI in refugee hearings across all four divisions. No party may have AI create or materially alter personal evidence, whether witness statements, affidavits or basis of claim narratives. Under these tribunal AI rules, filers answer for submissions, must verify AI-generated content and must disclose AI transcription or translation.
RegulationGovernment & Public SectorCanada5 Sep 2026
Quebec courts bar judges from using generative AI to decide cases
Quebec courts — The Quebec Court of Appeal, Superior Court, Court of Quebec and municipal courts jointly set generative AI rules for judges. Substantive legal reasoning, characterising or analysing facts, weighing evidence or credibility, deciding outcomes and drafting those passages stay off-limits; correcting, revising, rephrasing or translating a judge's own text, some administrative work and searching specified sources are allowed. These judicial AI guidelines followed a March report of a Quebec ruling citing nonexistent case law.
DeploymentGovernment & Public SectorCanada31 Aug 2026
Toronto police put AI plate readers across the force
Toronto Police Service — Toronto Police Service has deployed AI-powered cameras that read licence plates plus vehicle makes and models, which the service rates highly effective against crime. The system logs where and when vehicles are spotted and raises alerts officers can act on. Privacy researchers warn of possible misuse and mass surveillance while automatic plate recognition spreads through Canadian forces.
DeploymentGovernment & Public SectorCanada28 Aug 2026
Calgary scores 17,000 intersections with AI to rank pedestrian risk
City of Calgary — The City of Calgary has used an AI platform to score over 17,000 intersections lacking signals or flashing beacons from zero to 100 for pedestrian risk, publishing the 50 riskiest. All scored 93 or more, led by Martindale Boulevard and Martindale Gate N.E. (99.02). Staff recommend kerb extensions, rapid flashing beacons and similar fixes at 26 of them, costing roughly $6 million, with design in 2027 if council approves funding in November's budget talks. Ward 5 councillor Raj Dhaliwal backs data-driven decisions but wants the model's reasoning explained; last year 15 people died on Calgary streets.
DeploymentGovernment & Public SectorCanada7 Jul 2026
Alberta turns AI agents on 466 million lines of government code
Government of Alberta — Alberta's Ministry of Technology and Innovation has built and deployed AI agents on Anthropic's Claude models to review more than 466 million lines of government code, after 18 months of tool-building. The review gave the province its first full picture of system health, and it plans to use the agents to replace 185 ageing systems with 16 applications it fully owns. Its 21 technical papers are open for other governments to reuse.
DeploymentGovernment & Public SectorCanada17 Jun 2026
Toronto to add an AI chatbot to its redesigned 311 site
City of Toronto — The City of Toronto says it will launch its own AI chatbot for general public enquiries on its 311 site, leaving phone agents for harder issues. Part of a redesigned 311 website due by the end of 2026, it could explain how to file a request or how long a pothole repair takes. The city says 311 gets 1.5 million calls a year, about 60 per cent general enquiries.
RegulationGovernment & Public SectorCanada4 Jun 2026
Canada's national AI strategy: AI for All
Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada — In Toronto on 4 June 2026, Prime Minister Mark Carney rolled out AI for All, a national AI strategy setting Canada's five-year course on artificial intelligence. Officials expect CAD 200 billion added to the economy and 250,000 fresh AI-related roles, financed through incoming laws and programmes meant to keep rollout responsible. Public confidence, opportunity and Canadian sovereignty underpin the wider push toward AI adoption.
Evidence of impactGovernment & Public SectorCanada12 May 2026
12,000 Ontario civil servants used unapproved AI websites
Office of the Auditor General of Ontario — About 12,000 Ontario Public Service employees browsed close to 400 GenAI-related sites across five months, an audit by Ontario's Auditor General discovered, drawing on Microsoft Defender logs to reveal shadow AI in government spreading through Canada. Microsoft Copilot Chat alone holds security approval for OPS work, yet captured only six percent of that browsing — a clear sign of unapproved AI websites in daily use. Auditor Shelley Spence's review also pointed to persistent holes in the province's wider artificial intelligence strategy.
Burlington opens AI plan checking to building permit applicants
City of Burlington — eCheck lets applicants for a Burlington building permit pre-test designs free before formal submission. The Canadian City's AI building permit review tool checks proposals against zoning bylaws and the Ontario Building Code, covering ceiling heights and room sizes plus fire protection, setbacks, height, floor ratios, landscaping and parking. Mayor Marianne Meed Ward said Burlington is first in Canada to apply automated building code assessment pre-submission, ahead of other municipalities on early compliance checks.
Federal Court of Appeal gives registry staff an AI assistant
Federal Court of Appeal — Canada's Federal Court of Appeal built Amicus, an AI assistant for court registry staff answering procedural and operational questions. It draws sourced, verified material from a central database, so matching queries yield matching answers rather than results that vary by employee. Feedback has been strongly favourable; the goal is consistent, national service quality for internal teams and external litigants alike, functioning as a broader AI registry assistant.
DeploymentGovernment & Public SectorCanada19 Dec 2025
Windsor approves AI chatbot pilot for provincial offences
City of Windsor — Windsor's Provincial Offences Administration office will launch a voice-enabled AI chatbot for municipal government, answering resident calls over a six-month trial. Officials forecast it absorbing about 30 per cent of clerks' duties, with its $57,600 yearly cost offset in 10 months via staffing savings from this virtual assistant deployment.
RegulationGovernment & Public SectorCanada19 Dec 2025
Quebec publishes AI framework for all public bodies
Government of Quebec — Quebec's Government has ended a March 2025 ban on public bodies using AI virtual assistants, alongside two new papers on AI regulation public sector rules. One directive sets requirements for generative AI governance, risk management and data protection; a second updates guiding principles for trustworthy use. Together they frame how artificial intelligence deployment should proceed across every provincial public body.
RegulationGovernment & Public SectorCanada28 Nov 2025
Canada launches first public register of AI uses in federal government
Government of Canada — Canada's Treasury Board President Shafqat Ali unveiled a first-of-its-kind AI Register, giving Canadians AI transparency in government over how federal agencies use artificial intelligence. Hundreds of entries span automated decision tools and machine-generated policy drafting, letting residents track where departments test or deploy these systems. The launch delivers on a pledge inside the federal AI Strategy for the Public Service 2025-2027, promoting broader visibility into government AI deployment nationwide.
DeploymentGovernment & Public SectorCanada14 Nov 2025
Ontario gives 15,000 civil servants Microsoft Copilot in AI rollout
Government of Ontario — Over 15,000 Ontario civil servants use Microsoft Copilot weekly, Canada's largest known AI rollout in government, per internal figures. Common uses include tracking coverage and writing releases, while several hundred workers get deeper access through an advanced tier. It marks a growing embrace of generative AI in the public sector.
DeploymentGovernment & Public SectorCanada29 Sep 2025
Canada pilots GCtranslate AI tool in six federal departments
Government of Canada — Six federal agencies, PSPC, the Privy Council Office, Finance Canada and the RCMP among them, are testing GCtranslate, an AI translation in government pilot from Canada's Translation Bureau. Officials envision expanding the system across the entire public service eventually. Trained linguists assessed the AI translation tool for government use beforehand, after it handled more than 60 million words in prior trials.
RegulationGovernment & Public SectorCanada29 Sep 2025
Federal Court of Canada publishes AI principles barring automated rulings
Federal Court of Canada — Canada's Federal Court will withhold automated decision-making tools from judgments until public consultation occurs, per Interim Principles and Guidelines steering judicial AI governance, which covers automated tools in court rulings. Staff may still tap such systems for translation and clerical duties, so long as humans verify every output.
RegulationGovernment & Public SectorCanada29 Sep 2025
Federal Court interim principles and guidelines on AI
Federal Court of Canada — Canada's Federal Court bars judicial AI decision-making in judgments and orders without prior public consultation, under its Interim Principles and Guidelines on the Court's Use of Artificial Intelligence. Seven principles govern: accountability, rights, non-discrimination, accuracy, transparency, cybersecurity, human oversight. The standard is human-in-the-loop court decision-making, not automation.
Evidence of adoptionGovernment & Public SectorCanada18 Sep 2025
Half of Canadian public servants using AI rely on public tools, survey finds
KPMG in Canada — AI adoption in government stays low across Canada: KPMG in Canada polled 349 Canadian public servants, finding just 22 per cent of public sector bodies have formally embraced AI. Yet 48 per cent of staff use it unofficially, half via open tools such as ChatGPT instead of vetted systems — fuelling accuracy, privacy and security exposure. Weak literacy compounds this: 85 per cent call public sector AI knowledge poor, and 69 per cent confirm real unease over generative AI tools in the public sector.
RCMP pilots Axon AI to draft police reports from body camera audio
Royal Canadian Mounted Police — Eight British Columbia detachments plus two more in Alberta are piloting AI police report writing for the RCMP, feeding body-worn camera sound into Axon's Draft One to generate draft incident reports automatically. A $200,000 ceiling covers the 12-month trial, though human review stays compulsory — each AI-assisted incident report needs at least 10% altered by an officer before approval. The system draws on audio alone, excluding video or facial-recognition data entirely.
DeploymentGovernment & Public SectorCanada25 Jun 2025
Mount Royal launches Villemo conversational robot on municipal website
Town of Mount Royal — The Town of Mount Royal's website now runs Villemo, a conversational robot municipal website tool answering resident questions on demand. It reviews queries so officials spot recurring concerns and fine-tune services, storing no personal data, an AI chatbot for municipal services built with that privacy safeguard.
DeploymentGovernment & Public SectorCanada9 Apr 2025
Markham launches Millie as face of upgraded AI chatbot 3.0
City of Markham — Canada's first municipal mascot, Millie the butterfly, now represents Markham's AI chatbot for municipal government use. Built on Comm100, OpenAI and IBM Watson under the Chatbot 3.0 upgrade, this AI virtual assistant for city residents answers queries 24/7 via council website content.
RegulationGovernment & Public SectorCanada4 Mar 2025
Canada launches first AI strategy for the federal public service
Treasury Board of Canada — Canada's Treasury Board has unveiled its AI strategy for federal public service work, a 2025-2027 plan from Ginette Petitpas Taylor at the University of Waterloo. The strategy sets up a centre of AI expertise, mandates security and responsible-use rules, builds talent pipelines, and pledges transparency on government AI adoption plans.
CIBC has opened Canadian banking's first enterprise-wide agentic-AI workspace, and Sun Life has given advisers an AI note-taker.
DeploymentFinance & InsuranceCanada28 Oct 2026
PolicyMe gives its life insurance underwriters an in-house AI copilot
PolicyMe — PolicyMe has cut turnaround time on reviewed life insurance cases by 59%, its internal data show, using an AI underwriting copilot the Toronto distributor built for its underwriters. The assistant collects medical records, lab results and supporting files into one workspace, writes structured summaries, recommends evidence-backed decisions and drafts explanations for declined, postponed or rated applicants.
Canada Life's CaLi assistant now tracks insurance applications for advisors
Canada Life — Canada Life's CaLi, an AI assistant for insurance advisors, now shows live status on pending individual applications, from receipt to an offer, and names the coordinator on each file. Launched for workplace plan members in 2025, CaLi has handled more than 170,000 client chats and 16,000 with advisors, who previously phoned or emailed back-office staff for application tracking.
Evidence of adoptionFinance & InsuranceCanada20 Oct 2026
Nine in 10 Canadian financial planners say their firms use or plan AI
Financial Planning Standards Board — Nine in 10 Canadian planners in the Financial Planning Standards Board's 2026 Impact of AI on Financial Planning report say their firms use AI or will within 12 months. Oversight of AI in financial planning lags: 37% have a comprehensive policy, against 23% worldwide; 26% have broad rules and 16% none. On quality, 71% expect AI-assisted planning to improve advice, up from 67% in 2025.
Manulife gives Canadian advisors an AI assistant for underwriting questions
Manulife — Manulife has rolled out the Manulife Advisor AI Assistant, an AI underwriting tool inside its Advisor Portal where Canadian advisors get plain answers sourced from underwriting advisor handbooks. Version one spans life, critical illness and Synergy cover, helping prep client meetings before submission. Replies never bind on insurability or premiums; standard Manulife underwriting still rules on every case.
Manulife launches an enterprise AI platform to reuse vetted tools across markets
Manulife — Manulife has switched on an in-house enterprise AI platform giving teams one place to create, launch and oversee applications; anything cleared on security and governance in one market can be redeployed in others without restarting sign-off. Early tools include a Singapore sales assistant, shared document processing and Quick Quote, which accelerates preliminary life insurance assessment in the US. The insurer tallies US$300 million of AI value by end-2025 and targets US$1 billion cumulatively by 2027.
Evidence of adoptionFinance & InsuranceCanada6 Oct 2026
RBC holds third and TD returns to top 10 in Evident's bank AI index
Evident — RBC held third place for a fourth straight year and TD rose three places to 10th in Evident's AI Index, which grades bank AI maturity across 50 lenders in North America, Europe and Asia. JPMorganChase and Capital One stay ahead of RBC. BMO fell to 20th, CIBC rose to 21st and Scotiabank slipped to 30th.
Evidence of impactFinance & InsuranceCanada10 Sep 2026
Western Financial Group credits AI with 2.3% lift in client retention
Western Financial Group — Insurance brokerage Western Financial Group has rebuilt its service operations on Quandri's AI. The companies credit the change with a 15% lift in personal-lines EBITDA and $2.5 million extra margin, a 2.3% retention gain worth $1.5 million in marginal revenue, and 14 full-time roles moved from admin to client relationships, across 180-plus branches and 300,000 personal-lines policies. No independent evaluation exists, and the release gives no measurement period.
Evidence of impactFinance & InsuranceCanada10 Sep 2026
Scotiabank says AI saved 24,000 days of work in four months
Scotiabank — Artificial intelligence saved Scotiabank roughly 24,000 days' worth of work in about four and a half months, chief executive Scott Thomson has said, a headline for AI in Canadian banking. Bank of Montreal's Darryl White puts AI underwriting decisions in insurance at as little as 10 seconds. Royal Bank of Canada's investor day last year set a $700 million to $1 billion enterprise-value target by 2027. These bank AI productivity claims land as analysts weigh job impact.
Sun Life gives advisers an AI note-taker and a product concierge
Sun Life Canada — Sun Life's financial advisers have two AI tools: Notes Assistant, which summarises client meetings, drafts follow-up emails and compiles action items, and a new AI-powered adviser concierge answering product, policy and process questions. The insurer says Notes Assistant saves 15 to 30 minutes per client session and the concierge has handled over 11,000 client conversations since launch. Cutting admin frees advisers for client relationships, said Jessica Tan, executive vice-president and president of Sun Life Canada; Notes Assistant won a 2026 CIO Award Canada.
CIBC launches Canadian banking's first enterprise-wide agentic-AI workspace
CIBC — CIBC has introduced CAI 2.0, an agentic-AI workspace where employees hand complex, multi-step tasks to AI agents that plan, coordinate and finish them. The bank calls it the first enterprise-wide platform of its kind in Canadian banking, and says predecessor CAI reached over 50,000 employees worldwide, with about 20,000 daily users.
TD's agentic AI cuts mortgage pre-adjudication to three minutes
TD Bank Group — Canada's TD Bank Group has cut mortgage pre-adjudication times from 15 hours to under three minutes using an agentic AI model built by its Layer 6 unit. This agentic AI in mortgage underwriting also handles Home Equity Lines of Credit applications, drafting summary memos after joint work across TD's Global Technology & Solutions, data, Real Estate & Secured Lending and risk teams. The underwriting automation gain is an early internal estimate, unconfirmed by outside review.
Scotiabank launches Scotia Intelligence across branches and contact centres
Scotiabank — Scotiabank has launched Scotia Intelligence, a unified enterprise platform that gives employees governed AI tools and the Scotia Navigator assistant for everyday work, custom assistants and AI-assisted coding. Branches and contact centres were early adopters of purpose-built tools; the bank says AI now handles over 40 per cent of contact-centre client queries and processes and routes about 90 per cent of commercial banking emails.
Manulife's AI underwriting engine approves life policies in minutes
Manulife — Manulife has launched a redesigned e-application and upgraded MAUDE, its proprietary AI underwriting engine, that together auto-approve qualified life insurance applicants in as little as two minutes. Cases the engine cannot approve go to a human underwriter. By December, the chief underwriter said, 58 per cent of eligible cases were auto-approved through MAUDE, up 56 per cent on pre-launch levels.
CNA Canada deploys AI to speed insurance underwriting
CNA Insurance Canada — Select business lines at CNA Insurance Canada now run on mea Platform's Intelligent Underwriting AI, part of a November 2025 rollout the insurer plans to extend further, marking a fresh step in AI insurance underwriting. Structured and unstructured records feed the ingestion engine, which pulls out the data points needed for new business submissions without manual sorting. CNA credits the launch with fast turnaround and strong data accuracy, though that judgement comes from the company itself rather than an outside audit, underscoring the broader push toward AI-driven underwriting automation.
TD Wealth launches GenAI virtual assistant for advisors
TD Bank Group — TD Bank Group's Layer 6 team built a GenAI virtual assistant for advisors: the Wealth Virtual Assistant, letting TD Wealth staff prompt for policy answers instead of searching multiple systems. This AI knowledge management system for wealth advisors frees time for personalised client advice.
CIBC — CIBC switched on CRTeX (CIBC Real-Time Experience) nationwide on 16 October 2025, an AI-powered personalisation engine for banking built in-house. Near real-time decisions merge with customer preferences so the tool shapes offers across phone, app, website and branch contact. This AI-driven client engagement platform, tied into CIBC's existing systems, keeps the experience uniform.
RBC launches ATOM foundation model across the bank
Royal Bank of Canada — ATOM (Asynchronous Temporal Model), Royal Bank of Canada's proprietary foundation model, now powers credit adjudication and personalised Avion Rewards suggestions for 1.3 million monthly users, marking a live case of AI in corporate banking. The system draws on billions of client transactions through RBC's Lumina data platform. This machine learning in financial services rollout anchors RBC's targeted $700 million to $1 billion in AI-driven value by 2027.
TD launches generative AI assistant for TD Securities
TD Bank Group — TD Bank Group has piloted the TD Securities AI Virtual Assistant, a proprietary generative AI chatbot for institutional sales, trading and research staff answering clients faster. It uses retrieval-augmented generation and text-to-SQL to scan internal research documents, an AI virtual assistant in banking for internal workflows, not direct customer contact.
Securities professional, trader, research analystnewswire.ca
DeploymentFinance & InsuranceCanada27 May 2025
Markel Canada deploys agentic AI for insurance underwriting
Markel Canada — Markel's Canadian underwriters gain agentic AI for insurance underwriting under an expanded mea Platform deal, following London Wholesale's earlier rollout. Unstructured submission data becomes structured through the platform's agentic GenAI, sharpening decisions — a use some label agentic GenAI for underwriting.
Unity Health Toronto is trialling delirium prediction across 13 hospitals.
DeploymentHealthcare & Life SciencesCanada2 Oct 2026
Santé Québec Côte-Nord pilots an AI medical scribe with 70 staff
Santé Québec Côte-Nord — Santé Québec Côte-Nord has 70 employees across every discipline piloting an AI medical scribe, holding Quebec's first licence to extend such software to an entire regional health workforce. Physicians, nurses and occupational therapists get notes written for them, then check and sign. Milvue imaging software now flags fractures under a separate deal, and a Bia Assistant research trial in Basse-Côte-Nord helps decide when scans are needed.
Physicians, nurses and allied health professionalslemanic.ca
Evidence of adoptionHealthcare & Life SciencesCanada1 Oct 2026
Two-thirds of Ontario clinicians have used AI, 58% an AI scribe
OntarioMD — OntarioMD polled more than 1,600 Ontario family doctors, nurse practitioners and practice managers: 67% had used AI in care, measuring AI use among clinicians. AI scribes reached 58%, decision support 18% and inbox assistants 7%; 72% want provincial associations to vouch for safety. Fieldwork ran in March 2026.
Evidence of adoptionHealthcare & Life SciencesCanada1 Oct 2026
68% of Canadians are uneasy about US-based AI in their health system
Santis Health and Nanos Research — Santis Health and Nanos Research polling of 1,037 people found 68% at least somewhat uncomfortable with health services using AI tools based in the United States; 80% want health data kept in Canada, unused abroad for training. AI in health care wins backing under clinician control: 75% favour diagnostic help and 71% would let AI read tests or scans if specialists came sooner. Only 5% accept clinical AI diagnosing alone; fieldwork ran 30 August to 2 September.
DeploymentHealthcare & Life SciencesCanada23 Sep 2026
HEALWELL puts AI chart summaries before 400-plus New Brunswick clinicians
HEALWELL AI — HEALWELL AI opened SMART Summary to more than 400 New Brunswick healthcare providers, producing AI clinical summaries inside Intrahealth's Profile electronic medical record within seconds. Of 50 clinicians piloting this AI chart review tool across Ontario, British Columbia and New Brunswick, 84% foresaw time savings and 79% would recommend adoption.
DeploymentHealthcare & Life SciencesCanada15 Sep 2026
Waterloo Wellington mental health staff get an AI scribe
Canadian Mental Health Association Waterloo Wellington — Canadian Mental Health Association Waterloo Wellington is the first organisation running VitalHub AI Scribe, an AI scribe for mental health casework in the CaseWORKS case management solution. The ambient tool listens, extracts clinically relevant information and writes the paperwork: transcriptions, case notes, client and patient summaries. Chief executive Helen Fishburn says growing documentation requirements weigh on staff, and that AI documentation frees team members for clients and community.
DeploymentHealthcare & Life SciencesCanada10 Sep 2026
Loblaw's PC Health launches an AI health chat for Canadians
Loblaw Companies (PC Health) — Loblaw's PC Health has launched PC Chat, a free AI health tool answering questions in plain language from Canadian clinical guidelines and 1,000-plus Canadian clinical sources. It runs in most provinces on the PC Health and Shoppers Drug Mart apps and sites; New Brunswick and Quebec follow this autumn. Medical professionals on the Clinical AI Advisory Committee helped build it, and it suggests next steps such as seeing a healthcare provider.
DeploymentHealthcare & Life SciencesCanada4 Aug 2026
Unity Health Toronto trials AI to predict delirium across 13 hospitals
Unity Health Toronto — Unity Health Toronto's AI-assisted randomised trial with the GEMINI research network aims to predict and prevent delirium in 13 Ontario hospitals, funded by Ontario's Ministry of Health. The trial runs to March 2027 with about 15,000 patients and 2,000 frontline staff. An AI tool flags the highest-risk patients for prevention; researchers say it identifies delirium at about triple historical accuracy.
Evidence of impactHealthcare & Life SciencesCanada23 Jun 2026
AI scribes cut admin burden for 70% of Canadian family doctors
Canada Health Infoway — Canada Health Infoway's national AI Scribe Program shows AI medical scribes easing paperwork for most Canadian family doctors after six months. Among 12,019 clinicians enrolled June 2025 to February 2026, 70 percent cited lighter administrative strain and 80 percent cited reduced cognitive load from automated note-taking. Weekly hours saved averaged 1.11, same-day charting rose from 55.9% to nearly 75%, and monthly use of AI clinical documentation tools grew from 244,000 to 1.22 million encounters, per an independent review by the Centre for Digital Health Evaluation at the Women's College Hospital Institute for Health System Solutions and Virtual Care.
Evidence of impactHealthcare & Life SciencesCanada12 May 2026
All 20 approved Ontario AI scribes produced inaccuracies in testing
Office of the Auditor General of Ontario — Every one of the 20 vendors cleared for Ontario's AI medical scribes procurement list failed to pass testing cleanly, Auditor General Shelley Spence's review found, turning up at least one inaccuracy apiece. Fabricated content, wrong entries and incomplete or missing information all surfaced during evaluation, with nothing to show that additional scrutiny had followed to lower the danger of invented output before rollout. Spence warned that unreliable AI-generated clinical documentation risks producing harmful or insufficient treatment decisions for patients throughout Canada.
Evidence of adoptionHealthcare & Life SciencesCanada2026-01
More than 440 Nova Scotia clinicians now use AI scribes
Nova Scotia Department of Health and Wellness — Over 440 medical professionals in Nova Scotia now use AI scribes to record patient visits, according to Department of Health and Wellness figures. Their licences come from Canada Health Infoway's national programme, which funds a free first-year AI documentation licence for eligible primary care clinicians; the province holds 500 funded licences, and Mika is its only approved scribe. Infoway says 95 per cent of AI-scribe users nationwide report less administrative burden.
DeploymentHealthcare & Life SciencesCanada6 Aug 2025
KHSC becomes first Canadian hospital to adopt HeartFlow AI for coronary diagnosis
Kingston Health Sciences Centre — Canada's first hospital use of HeartFlow puts AI coronary artery disease diagnosis inside Kingston Health Sciences Centre, turning CT scans into 3D arterial maps that calculate blood flow and avoid catheterisation. Stephen Sorensen's $100,000 gift paid for it. Doctors now have a non-surgical path to AI heart disease detection in blocked arteries.
DeploymentHealthcare & Life SciencesCanada15 Jul 2025
Bruyère Health adopts Esprit-ai sensor platform to prevent falls in long-term care
Bruyère Health — Bruyère Health fitted Esprit-ai's Sense platform in its Ottawa home, sensors under mattresses catching bed exits, lowering fall risk in long-term care. A nine-month trial came first: 91% alert adherence, zero falls logged. Alerts now flag pressure injuries early, reducing falls in care homes.
Island Health rolls out AI-enhanced MRI across five Vancouver Island hospitals
Island Health — Joint scans at Nanaimo Regional General Hospital now take five minutes, down from 10-15, using trial AI-enhanced MRI. Island Health made the AI-assisted MRI software permanent, expanding it to Royal Jubilee Hospital, Victoria General Hospital, Campbell River and Comox Valley.
Quebec deploys AI triage software Navig across all 766 family medicine clinics
Quebec Ministry of Health — Vitr.ai's AI-powered patient triage tool Navig has replaced nurse- and physician-led first assessment across all 766 GMF (Groupes de médecine de famille) clinics in Quebec, from 1 April 2025, under a $40 million contract. This AI triage software interviews arriving patients through a secretary, then assigns each to a pharmacist, psychologist, physiotherapist or doctor as appropriate.
DeploymentLegal & Professional ServicesCanada5 Oct 2026
TC Energy rolls out Harvey across its legal team
TC Energy — TC Energy's lawyers now use the Harvey legal AI platform team-wide, after a pilot where leadership told staff to start matters there under a 'Harvey-First' directive. The generative AI tool covers work in Canada, the United States and Mexico; Harvey published the news.
DeploymentLegal & Professional ServicesCanada6 Jul 2026
Fasken deploys Legora firmwide after helping build Walter AI
Fasken — Fasken is putting Legora's agentic AI workspace in front of all 900-plus lawyers for review, analysis and drafting on complex matters. Fasken lawyers co-developed the Walter AI Assistant before Legora bought Walter AI in March 2026. Firm Managing Partner Clarke Barnes expects the firmwide deployment to speed up high-quality legal work.
DeploymentLegal & Professional ServicesCanada26 May 2026
McCarthy Tétrault partner says AI cut a six-hour term sheet review to one
McCarthy Tétrault — McCarthy Tétrault lawyers report AI in transactional work turning a six-hour term sheet review into one hour, says Matthew Peters, partner and national leader of transformation, who hears this roughly every other day. Human-in-the-loop rules came early, adoption is organised by workflow, and MT❯Forge handles high-volume deals.
DeploymentLegal & Professional ServicesCanada13 Apr 2026
Torys rolls out Harvey firmwide with onsite support
Torys — Torys is deploying Harvey's legal AI firmwide, among the first Canadian firms to do so at scale. Harvey staff will work onsite building Torys-specific workflows and driving uptake across practice groups, with managing partner Matt Cockburn and chief knowledge and innovation officer Sukesh Kamra fronting the AI rollout.
DeploymentLegal & Professional ServicesCanada17 Dec 2025
McMillan adopts Legora AI platform firmwide across Canada
McMillan LLP — McMillan LLP now leads Canada as the first national firm to roll out Legora firmwide, opening the AI platform for lawyers to its entire staff. Selection followed scrutiny of security, privacy, dependability and features. That scrutiny underpins the firm's push into generative AI for lawyers.
DeploymentLegal & Professional ServicesCanada3 Dec 2025
BLG adopts CoCounsel firmwide for AI-powered legal work
Borden Ladner Gervais LLP (BLG) — Thomson Reuters' CoCounsel now runs firmwide at Borden Ladner Gervais LLP, giving staff AI legal research access. The tool covers generative AI legal drafting and document review, linked to Westlaw and Practical Law. BLG is one of two national full-service Canadian firms with this partnership.
DeploymentLegal & Professional ServicesCanada31 Jul 2025
KMSC Law deploys Alexi legal AI across the entire firm
KMSC Law — Over 100 KMSC Law staff spanning legal, administrative and operational roles now apply AI legal research via Alexi's legal intelligence platform, deployed firm-wide within a private cloud environment. Uses include drafting, summarisation and correspondence, with nearly 70 per cent of these users non-lawyers.
DeploymentLegal & Professional ServicesCanada11 Jul 2025
Gowling WLG rolls out Harvey AI across all Canadian offices
Gowling WLG — Gowling WLG has become the first Canadian law firm to deploy Harvey AI legal software nationwide, extending it to every practice group. Personnel now rely on the generative platform for research, diligence checks, reporting and client advisory needs. Beforehand, an internal audit had already surfaced hundreds of promising uses for AI in legal services.
Ontario Tech built its own AI learning agent and put it into 22 courses across every faculty.
DeploymentEducation & TrainingCanada2 Oct 2026
University of Alberta pilots LearnWise AI course assistants in Canvas
University of Alberta — University of Alberta students and instructors have LearnWise AI assistants inside Canvas for a pilot running September 2026 to May 2027. Replies within a class draw only on instructor-uploaded content, and any instructor can disable the course assistant. Lecture material and student chats stay out of commercial model training, the university states.
Evidence of adoptionEducation & TrainingCanada4 Sep 2026
Three in four Canadian students use generative AI for schoolwork
KPMG Canada — KPMG Canada polling from 22 July to 5 August 2026 found three-quarters of Canadian students use generative AI for schoolwork. Among educators, 59% doubt the system prepares students for AI-heavy jobs and 72% call such student AI use cheating, against 50% of students. Just 53% of students got formal responsible-AI teaching.
Vancouver school board gives students aged 13 and up Copilot
Vancouver School Board — Microsoft Copilot chatbot accounts reached secondary pupils aged 13 and up across Vancouver School Board, Canada, part of a wider push on AI in schools. Guardrails filter harmful material, shield privacy and prevent chats from training AI models, while staff describe the effort as building safe, thoughtful habits among learners. New teacher guidance arrived alongside this classroom AI rollout.
Ontario Tech pilots an in-house AI learning agent in 22 courses
Ontario Tech University — Ontario Tech University has put an in-house AI Learning Agent into 22 undergraduate and graduate courses across every faculty for the Winter and Spring 2026 terms. Drawing only on instructor-approved course materials, it prompts students with guiding questions instead of giving answers, and faculty control access and content. Instructors see recurring student questions live, helping them target teaching, the university says; in this pilot, student testers help refine and govern the tool.
Quebec school board gives students and staff four generative AI tools
Centre de services scolaire des Chênes — Centre de services scolaire des Chênes in Drummondville added four generative AI tools — Microsoft Copilot Chat, Canva, Google Gemini and Gemini Notebook — to its toolkit. Secondary, vocational and adult-education students, teachers and special-education technicians got access first, ahead of administrative and professional staff from 15 September and primary pupils later, extending AI in Quebec schools via generative AI in education.
Quebec school board pilots Emilia AI correction tool for teachers
Centre de services scolaire De La Jonquière — Marking time per text has dropped from 15 to 5 minutes since Centre de services scolaire De La Jonquière began trialling AI essay marking via Emilia, a Quebec-built correction software, in Saguenay–Lac-Saint-Jean classrooms. The tool also pinpoints each learner's weak spots, guiding teachers toward tailored follow-up. Trials are expanding into Mauricie as Emilia's rollout progresses.
Quebec rolls out AI dropout prediction tool across school service centres
Quebec Ministry of Education — 22 Quebec school service centres now fully run an AI dropout prediction tool, 27 more mid-rollout. GRICS built the system for the Ministry of Education, scanning grades and attendance to flag Grade 6 through Secondary V students at risk of leaving school early. Mila, Obvia and CTREQ shaped its design, part of predicting student dropout risk.
19.2% of Canadian businesses used AI, triple the 2024 rate, though the adopters' productivity edge narrows to 5% once controls are added.
Evidence of adoptionBusiness OperationsCanada10 Sep 2026
Two-thirds of Canadian firms pilot agentic AI, yet 97% feel unready
SAP and Oxford Economics — 66% of Canadian organisations are piloting agentic AI, yet 97% admit they are not fully ready to deploy and govern it, SAP's Value of AI Report by Oxford Economics finds (2,600 business leaders in 13 countries, 200 in Canada). Among Canadian leaders, 70% either agreed or could not say whether they deploy AI agents faster than governance keeps pace, and 73% struggle with incomplete or inconsistent data.
19.2% of Canadian businesses used AI, triple the 2024 rate
Canadian business AI adoption reached 19.2% in Q2 2026, triple the 6.1% of Q2 2024, counting use to produce goods or deliver services over the prior 12 months. Rates ran from 42.3% in information and cultural industries to 4.5% in agriculture; 44.4% of firms changed training or staffing because of AI use. Cybersecurity or privacy (13.4%) and cost (10.6%) led the barriers.
AI adopters' productivity edge shrinks to 5% once controls are added
Linking AI-adoption survey answers to administrative business microdata, Statistics Canada found the raw productivity premium of AI adopters mostly vanishes once other firm traits are controlled for. Adopters' labour productivity was 16.8% above non-adopters' at baseline, 10.2% after controlling for prior productivity, and 5.1%, statistically insignificant, after adding complementary capabilities: robotics, cloud computing, data analytics, R&D and ICT training. Built on 2019 and 2021 survey waves, it predates generative AI.
Canadian Tire has rolled out Microsoft Copilot alongside AI pricing tools.
DeploymentRetail & ConsumerCanada20 Aug 2026
Canadian Tire rolls out Microsoft Copilot and AI pricing tools
Canadian Tire — Canadian Tire is giving corporate staff Microsoft 365 Copilot alongside AI pricing and retail-intelligence tools. Its DaiVID platform sets prices and promotions, while MOSaiC, built with Microsoft on Azure, had found over 1,000 customer 'life occasions' and 180,000 demand signals by the first quarter of 2026. Staff numbers were not disclosed.
Loblaw launches a grocery shopping app inside ChatGPT
Loblaw Companies — Loblaw has put a PC Express app inside ChatGPT, letting Canadians order groceries and plan meals with their local store by chat. OpenAI models already run behind its own tools, including Robin, an AI assistant for store owners and managers, and agentic supply-chain systems for inventory accuracy and logistics. Corporate staff will get ChatGPT Enterprise.
Mitsubishi Motors Canada launches AI buying assistant for Outlander
Mitsubishi Motor Sales of Canada — Mitsubishi Motor Sales of Canada built an AI car-buying assistant called Intelligent Companion for shoppers browsing the 2025 Outlander. Running on IBM watsonx with its Granite model, it renders 3D feature tours tailored per visitor, an AI-powered buying experience guiding them to purchase.
Toyota's Ontario plants run Agility's Digit humanoids on tote handling after a year-long onsite pilot.
Evidence of adoptionManufacturing, Energy & ResourcesCanada6 Oct 2026
Half of Canada's heavy-industry workers use AI, mostly without training
Punchcard Systems — AI use in heavy industry reaches 49% of Canadian blue-collar workers, yet 70% of those users lack formal training, 87% in construction, a Punchcard Systems poll of 1,100 people with Angus Reid shows. Sectors covered energy, agriculture, automotive, natural resources, construction and manufacturing. Uptake is mostly employee-led, via chatbots and general-purpose tools.
DeploymentManufacturing, Energy & ResourcesCanada19 Feb 2026
Toyota's Ontario plants put Digit humanoids on tote handling
Toyota Motor Manufacturing Canada — Toyota Motor Manufacturing Canada has signed a commercial deal with Agility Robotics to run Digit humanoid robots in its Ontario vehicle plants, after a year-long pilot with three robots through development, proof-of-technology and onsite phases. Seven more robots will move totes on and off an automated tugger. Toyota's plant president cited team member experience and operational efficiency.
Air Transat runs its disruption recovery on AI built in Montreal.
DeploymentTransport & LogisticsCanada16 Sep 2026
Loblaw widens EAIGLE gate automation across its distribution yards
Loblaw Companies Limited — Loblaw Companies Limited is widening AI gate automation to more yards and distribution centres, deepening a tie-up with Canadian firm EAIGLE. EAIGLE's Vision AI, branded AVAC, reads vehicles and captures freight data as trucks arrive, feeding warehouse, transport and yard management software plus ERP. Earlier sites trimmed processing times, smoothed the driver experience and sharpened data accuracy, which prompted the wider automated gate rollout.
Air Transat runs its disruption recovery on Montreal-built AI
Air Transat — Air Transat, launch airline for Montreal firm stratosX, runs its X360 decision-support platform in its operations centre. Combining predictive modelling and generative AI with the airline's operations data, it recommends aircraft and passenger rerouting through schedule changes, delays and cancellations, with crew, aircraft and passenger data in one view. Air Transat co-develops it with stratosX and expects faster recovery, clearer cross-team visibility and steadier decisions.
JPI Farms uses AI crop controller across 22 hectares of peppers
JPI Farms — Zero round-the-clock monitoring, 22 hectares of peppers: JPI Farms, a Canadian greenhouse business, now runs Blue Radix's Crop Controller — an AI crop controller — full-time, having piloted it in 2023. Owner John Giesbrecht calls the autonomous growing tool a genuine "stress reliever". Cucumbers grow there too, bound for buyers in Canada and the United States.
Manulife rolls out generative AI tools to its entire global workforce
Manulife — Manulife has extended generative AI in insurance to 100% of its global workforce, and 75% regularly turn to ChatMFC, its proprietary GenAI assistant, alongside supporting training. Spanning Canada, the US and Asia, over 35 GenAI applications are already operating, with 70 further ones lined up for 2025. Nearly 200 machine learning engineers and data scientists underpin this generative AI adoption in insurance, pushing usage company-wide.
Bell launches AI-based detection to block spoofed calls for customers
Bell — Bell has launched AI-based 'Suspicious Call Detection', which automatically spots and blocks spoofed calls on iOS and Android for customers of Bell, Virgin Plus, Lucky Mobile and its other mobile brands, with no opt-in. Bell calls itself Canada's first carrier to flag spoofing with AI; its existing anti-fraud technology had analysed 4.4 billion calls and blocked or labelled over 540 million suspicious ones.
Bell Cyber puts a Cohere-built security AI model into production
Bell Canada (Bell Cyber) — Bell Canada has put a cybersecurity AI model, built with Cohere, into production inside Bell Cyber's Autonomous Security Operations Centre to speed threat investigations. By condensing complex alerts and surfacing the context each case needs, the security language model trims analysts' information-gathering. Bell AI Fabric infrastructure hosts the system, keeping processing and sensitive data in a Canadian-hosted environment.
DeploymentPolicyMe gives its life insurance underwriters an in-house AI copilotFinance & Insurance28 Oct 2026coverager.com
Evidence of impactOttawa's GCtranslate AI tool mistranslated terms and swapped namesGovernment & Public Sector22 Oct 2026ici.radio-canada.ca
DeploymentCanada Life's CaLi assistant now tracks insurance applications for advisorsFinance & Insurance21 Oct 2026investmentexecutive.com
RegulationCanadian Judicial Council issues new AI and deepfake evidence guidelines for judgesGovernment & Public Sector20 Oct 2026canadianlawyermag.com
Evidence of adoptionNine in 10 Canadian financial planners say their firms use or plan AIFinance & Insurance20 Oct 2026insurance-portal.ca
DeploymentManulife gives Canadian advisors an AI assistant for underwriting questionsFinance & Insurance14 Oct 2026insurancebusinessmag.com
DeploymentManulife launches an enterprise AI platform to reuse vetted tools across marketsFinance & Insurance13 Oct 2026insurancebusinessmag.com
Evidence of adoptionOttawa adds C$500 million to its Regional AI Initiative for business adoptionGovernment & Public Sector13 Oct 2026canada.ca
Evidence of adoptionTwo-thirds of Canadian public servants now use AI, KPMG survey findsGovernment & Public Sector13 Oct 2026kpmg.com
DeploymentHalton police use AI simulations to hire and train 911 call takersGovernment & Public Sector9 Oct 2026cp24.com
Your essential monthly update on Applied AI, with Canada specially tracked
We research and keep track of applied AI globally. Canada's record gained 19 entries in October. Your next dispatch will open with Canada, then the most important news about how AI is being used, applied and regulated globally.
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Method and sources
Every entry on this page is a named organisation putting AI to work in a real job, taken from the State of Applied AI record. Each one is traced to the report it came from and dated, and where a figure is the organisation’s own the entry says so rather than presenting it as an independent result. Readiness, ecosystem and policy figures, where shown, are attributed on the card to the body that published them.
The record is maintained continuously by the Industrial Research Unit of the Straits Institute for Applied AI: entries are added as they are found and verified, not on a schedule, and nothing is published without an open source behind it. It currently holds 4731 entries across 249 countries.
Canada22 Oct 2026
United States