ABOUT THIS EPISODE
Dr. Nadine Tatton is a University of Toronto-trained neuroscientist who has spent her career at the intersection of neurodegenerative disease research and drug development. She helped grow the Association for Frontotemporal Degeneration's research funding from $250,000 to $6 million, plus another $10 million in partnered programs, later supported strategy at Alector, and most recently served as executive director of the Critical Path for Alzheimer's Disease Consortium. She left Canada nearly two decades ago to build that career in the US, and she's watching from the outside for a way back in.Nadine opens with a theory none of this show's earlier guests have raised: that Canadian risk aversion isn't just a funding problem, it's a cultural inheritance from Victorian Britain, where boasting about achievement was considered ungentlemanly, and where "amateur" outranked "professional" as the higher compliment. She traces a straight line from that 19th-century mindset to a very current Canadian instinct to celebrate coming in second, and argues that instinct, more than any single policy, shapes everything downstream: what gets funded, what gets said out loud, and who eventually leaves.She and Natalie trace how that plays out concretely: identical tech roles paying tens of thousands of dollars less in Canada than the equivalent US position once stock, bonuses, and total compensation are factored in, Canadian startups typically taking years longer than their US counterparts to reach the same funding stage, and founders describing having to navigate six to eight different taxes just to get a company off the ground, only to be taxed again on any profit they manage to generate. Nadine also walks through why so many Canadian-founded companies incorporate in Delaware rather than at home: it's simply easier, and it's advice tech transfer offices themselves routinely give.Drawing on her years building a nonprofit research funding engine in the US, including a single $40 million donation that permanently secured an organization's future, Nadine contrasts the scale and business sophistication of American disease-advocacy fundraising with what's realistically achievable in Canada, and revisits the Connaught Labs story: 65 years spent developing and manufacturing insulin and diphtheria treatments domestically, sold off in stages through the '70s and '80s, and a capability Canada has never rebuilt since.The conversation closes on two notes of genuine optimism: Nadine sees the current disruption in US research funding as an opening for Canada to attract displaced scientific talent, and she argues Canada has leaned on a single trading partner for too long when it has the global trust and reputation to diversify into much broader partnerships. And when asked directly what role she'd want if she returned, her answer is blunt: not inside government. She wants the freedom to say what she actually thinks.This is Breaking Innovation Paralysis: research for a book on why Canada keeps losing the cures, capital, and companies it builds. Not a promotional platform, an honest look at the structural gaps: inertia, risk aversion, and diffusion of responsibility.If this shifted how you think about Canada's innovation gap, share it with someone who needs to hear it.🎧 New episodes weekly. Subscribe for more honest conversations with the people building, gatekeeping, and navigating Canada's innovation journey.🔗 Questions, feedback, or want to connect? https://augmentios.com/contact
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