Advanced manufacturing refers to the use of leading edge processes, materials, technologies and manufacturing methods to transform raw materials into marketable end products.

Manufacturing is Manitoba’s largest industrial sector. It accounts for approximately 14 per cent of our GDP and directly employs about one in eight Manitobans. In total, 71,000 Manitobans are employed in the manufacturing sector.

Like Manitoba’s economy as a whole, the manufacturing sector is diverse. It produces a wide variety of consumer and intermediate goods. Some of these goods are well known.

Palliser Furniture, located in Winnipeg, is Canada’s largest furniture factory. Winnipeg is also North America’s largest centre for bus manufacturing with two major companies – Motor Coach Industries and New Flyer Industries.

Maple Leaf Foods operates one of the worlds largest, most technologically advanced, meat processing plants in Brandon and Manitoba.

Canada’s third-largest aerospace centre, with over $1 billion in annual sales. More than 100 clothing companies make the province Canada’s third largest apparel manufacturing centre.

Considerable growth in a number of other manufacturing industries has occurred over the past several years.

Manitoba continues to expand in many strategically important areas, such as pharmaceuticals, biomedical equipment, nutraceuticals, electronics, chemicals and plastics.

Advanced manufacturing examples range from the manufacture of composite components for the aerospace industry and the use of electron beam technology to cure composite components, to the use of Six Sigma technique (process improvement and data-driven problem solving) to improve productivity and reduce waste and costs.

Advanced manufacturing covers a broad spectrum of Manitoba’s manufacturing sectors.

Also visit the following sections:

• Manitoba's OEM Advantages
• Industry Sector Summaries