Hold the phone

Good morning. Canada is about to get more of that one thing it just doesn’t have enough of: Tim Hortons locations. 

Following a solid quarterly earnings beat, the CEO of Tims’ parent company Restaurant Brands International said they are planning “hundreds of millions of dollars of investments” in Canada that will include opening new locations and remodelling more than 300 old ones. 

It’s nice to see someone is finally addressing this national crisis. 

Today’s reading time is 5 minutes.

Markets: Canada’s main stock index hit a two-week high yesterday as reinvigorated U.S.-Iran peace talks boosted investor sentiment and gold prices, with the materials sector up 6.5%.

Canada’s auto sector just suffered another blow.

What happened: Honda is reportedly shelving plans to build a $15 billion electric vehicle complex in Alliston, Ontario, a project that would have been the largest foreign investment in Canada’s history.

Why it’s happening: Demand for EVs in the U.S. collapsed after the Trump administration reversed Biden-era consumer tax incentives, falling 36% on the year in the quarter after they expired. In Canada, adoption has also stalled.

Why it matters: To say that Canada’s auto sector is going through a rough patch would be to put it too mildly. Nearly all of the planned investment in a domestic EV supply chain has now been cancelled.

Our take: Unfortunately, the problems plaguing Canada’s auto sector aren’t contained to EVs. Without a U.S. market to sell vehicles into — and the political mood south of the border is decidedly not friendly to free trade — the future of the industry here is in real doubt.—TS

Iran and the U.S. seem to be getting closer to a deal. The two sides are working on a one-page agreement to serve as the basis for a longer round of peace talks, which could take months. It’s unclear what the status of the Strait of Hormuz would be during that time, but oil prices fell and equities rose on optimism that it would reopen. (Axios)

OpenAI violated Canadian privacy law. Canada’s privacy commissioner and provincial counterparts found that OpenAI “did not respect federal and provincial privacy laws” when it gathered data — including Canadians’ personal information — to train its AI models. OpenAI said it disagreed with the findings and that it was compliant with Canada’s privacy laws “in most respects.” (CBC News)

Ottawa and Alberta are getting closer to a pipeline deal. The province and the federal government have reached an agreement on two of four outstanding issues in the memorandum of understanding signed last year, but are still working out the details on the timeline to reach the agreed-upon industrial carbon price and develop a large carbon capture facility. Mark Carney and Premier Danielle Smith are expected to meet later this week. (Globe and Mail)

📡 What else is on our radar: 

Every day, people count on public services to access benefits, keep food safe, protect communities, and respond when disaster strikes.

But Prime Minister Carney’s government is cutting those services, leaving workers and their families who are already stretched thin, without support. The consequences are real: longer waits, growing backlogs, and greater uncertainty when support is needed most.

Great nations aren’t built through austerity – they’re built by investing in the public services people rely on and the workers who deliver them.

If this government is serious about a strong Canada, it should invest in strong, reliable public services.

For you, for your loved ones, for your community — For You, Canada.

A new study co-led by Harvard researchers found that OpenAI’s o1 model outperformed two doctors in making emergency room diagnoses. When the model and the doctors were given the same patient information in triage (the first step in emergency care), the model got an “exact or very close diagnosis” 67% of the time compared with 55% and 50% for the MDs.

Why it matters: While there are caveats to these results — the authors themselves point out that the models were only really tested on analyzing text prompts — they do provide early evidence that AI models could one day become a standard tool for ER diagnoses.

Is there a truer adage than ‘what’s old is new again?’ We ask because, in the year 2026, a new type of landline is all the rage.

Driving the news: Tin Can, a startup that makes “new-school landlines” for kids, launched a program for parents, schools, and organizers to make bulk purchases of their Wi-Fi-enabled plug-in phones at a reduced cost. The program aims to capitalize on the product’s surging popularity.

Catch-up: Sporting funky, retro designs that evoke reveries of pizza nights and VHS tapes, Tin Cans work like a VoIP service. They make free calls to other Tin Cans and emergency services, and parents can add on access to approved outside numbers for a monthly fee.

Why it matters: More and more parents want to keep their kids off smartphones for as long as possible because… I mean, do we really need to tell you? While some tweens use flip phones or smartwatches, Tin Can is a potential communications solution for younger kids.

Zoom out: Aside from shielding kids from the horrors of the digital world, landlines can also grant a sense of independence by empowering them to manage their own relationships and make their own plans, and gain phone etiquette skills many Gen Zers may have lost.—QH

With the ServiceNow AI Control Tower, you get a real-time view of any model, data source, and AI agent working across every corner of your business. So you can manage performance, protect your sensitive data, and make confident decisions. All in one place.

🤑 US$1.2 trillion. Valuation of Samsung (as of writing), with the South Korean electronics giant becoming the 13th company to enter the trillion-dollar market cap club yesterday. The company, which is the world’s largest memory maker, has been lifted by the AI boom. For example, last week its semiconductor arm reported a stupefying 48-fold increase in profit.

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