HAMILTON, ON, Oct. 22, 2026 /CNW/ — On behalf of the Honourable Mélanie Joly, Minister of Industry and Minister responsible for Canada Economic Development for Quebec Regions, Karim Bardeesy, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Industry, will announce the results of multiple federal research grants that will help attract and retain talent, strengthen research security and support discoveries.

Parliamentary Secretary Bardeesy will be joined by Normand Labrie, Interim President of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

The announcement will be immediately followed by media availability.

Date: Friday, October 23, 2026

Time: 8:45 a.m. (eastern)

Location: Hamilton, Ontario

Members of the media are asked to register at communications@chairs-chaires.gc.ca to receive event location details and confirm their attendance.

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SOURCE Government of Canada

Fall Showcase 2026 introduces LLC formation and a business bank account,1 AI connectors, expanded compliance and payroll tools, new benefits and HR support, and the company’s biggest-ever updates for accountants

SAN FRANCISCO, Oct. 22, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — Gusto, the small business platform for payroll, benefits, and HR, today announced new products and features at its Fall Showcase, designed to help small business owners start, run, and grow.

Every day, Gusto helps more than half a million small businesses pay their teams, stay compliant, and offer benefits. The announcements take aim at what owners face: serving customers, managing finances, keeping up with compliance, competing for talent, and making sense of AI, often all at once.

“Small business owners wear every hat, and they shouldn’t have to carry every burden too,” said Chris Cosgrove, Chief Product Officer at Gusto. “Our goal is to make the hard things easier, starting on day one.”

Start: Help before the first hire

Owners can now form an LLC, open a business bank account,1 and see where their money stands in Gusto, before they hire anyone. Because it all lives in the same place they’ll later hire, pay, and grow, there’s no need to start over down the road.

“Starting a business has typically meant figuring it out alone, and every one of those steps is a place where a good idea can stall,” said Cosgrove. “Our bet is simple: if it’s easier to get started, more people will, and more of them will succeed.”

Run: Less risk, less busywork

Growth for a small business means more complexity and behind-the-scenes work. Gusto’s new features help owners stay compliant, automate payroll and contractor payments, and put AI to work on time-consuming tasks.

Gusto Business Compliance handles obligations that trip up owners, especially when they hire in a new state, including state tax registration, annual report filing, and government mail monitoring.Multi-location payroll runs one payroll for hourly employees who work across state or city lines, calculating and filing taxes for each work location.Intelligent payroll automations gather hours, flag anomalies, anything unusual, and turn payroll into a quick review and sign-off.More control over pay, with same-day pay for off-cycle bonuses and corrections for eligible businesses, custom semi-monthly schedules, and printed, mailed paychecks with delivery tracking.Contractor tools that let owners hire and pay U.S. and international contractors on one platform. With invoice ingestion, Gusto reads an uploaded invoice and prefills the paysheet for review and approval.Project tracking lets owners tag hours to projects, clients, and tasks and see the true labor cost of every job.

Owners can now connect Gusto to Claude, ChatGPT, and other AI tools to ask questions about payroll and teams, prep payroll, and generate reports. Owners have full transparency and control over the output, with the ability to approve every change before it’s final. Developers and power users can also connect through Gusto’s MCP server or install the Gusto CLI in one command, so an agent can prepare what it can before each payroll and send a prioritized list of decisions that need the owner’s approval.

“Owners shouldn’t have to learn a new tool to put AI to work. Gusto works where they already do,” said Cosgrove. “AI does the prep, and the owner stays in control of every decision.”

Grow: Benefits, guidance, and HR support

Great benefits help business owners hire and keep great people, but most don’t have an HR department to lean on. Gusto is putting that expertise inside its platform, so owners can invest in their teams for the long term.

Gus, the AI Benefits Assistant gives personalized, real-time guidance on benefits and builds a ready-to-submit package covering medical, dental, vision, and more. A licensed advisor reviews it before anything is finalized.Gusto 401(k), built into Gusto helps business owners manage retirement plans directly on Gusto, without switching platforms.Health Reimbursement Arrangements (HRAs) give employees the flexibility to choose health coverage that works for them, while employers maintain complete control over costs by setting a monthly allowance. Employers can seamlessly manage reimbursements alongside payroll in Gusto.Voluntary Life & Disability benefits provide employee-paid coverage added through automatic payroll deductions, at no additional direct cost to the business.Guided benefits renewal provides cost-optimized options, side-by-side comparisons, and direct access to a licensed benefits advisor.New HR resources let owners build an employee handbook and generate documents like performance improvement plans and termination letters. Owners also get proactive alerts when employment laws change, written answers from a human HR expert, and instant answers from Gus.Gusto HR Partners gives you access to an experienced, fractional HR professional without the cost of a full-time hire.Gusto Professional Employer Organization (PEO) helps take on much of the day-to-day HR, payroll, benefits, and compliance work for small business owners.

Gusto, built for accountants that support small businesses

Today, more than two-thirds of small businesses on Gusto have the support of a Gusto accounting partner. These firms play a vital role in advising and supporting small businesses. That’s why Gusto has announced its biggest-ever updates for accountants, including:

A redesigned Gusto Pro dashboard with AI-assisted workflows.A Multi-Client MCP that lets firms work across selected clients in a single AI conversation.An expanded Partner Program with Marketing and Partner Development Funds.Solo Advisory Tools, helping firms advise solopreneur clients with calculators for S-corp election and reasonable compensation estimates.

To learn more, visit Gusto’s Fall Showcase.

1 Gusto is a financial technology company, not a bank. Banking services provided by Increase Bank, Member FDIC.

About Gusto

Gusto takes the guesswork out of running a small business. From forming a company to paying a team to staying on top of compliance, Gusto simplifies payroll, benefits, HR, and money management so business owners can get back to the work that matters most. Founded in 2011, Gusto supports more than 500,000 small businesses from offices in San Francisco, New York, and Denver. Learn more about Gusto’s mission to grow the small business economy with technology and heart at gusto.com.

Media Contact:
Candice So
press@gusto.com

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SOURCE Gusto, Inc.

Fortera to launch patented sustainable cement technology, producing 300,000 tons of ReAct® cement annually using carbon captured from MLC’s lime production

STE. GENEVIEVE, Mo., Oct. 22, 2026 /CNW/ — Fortera and MLC plan to build Fortera’s first commercial low-carbon cement plant at MLC’s Ste. Genevieve site. The plant would capture CO₂ emitted by MLC’s lime production and transform it into a reactive cement that is nearly 50% captured CO₂ by weight.

The Ste. Genevieve operation was selected due to its scale and strategic location. Situated in the Central Midwest on the Mississippi River, the site enables economical delivery across most of the U.S. and internationally. Adding domestic cement supply also reduces U.S. reliance on foreign imports, which account for 21% of consumption, according to the 2025 U.S. Geological Survey.

ReAct cement is one of the most consequential cement innovations in generations, introducing a fundamentally new way to manufacture an essential building material that meets or exceeds traditional cement’s performance.

By transforming captured CO₂ from lime production into value-added cement, this project offers an approach to reduce the carbon footprint of two critical, hard-to-abate industries. Cement accounts for 8% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions (according to the U.S. Department of Energy), so innovations have the potential to meaningfully impact global climate change.

“The Ste. Genevieve plant marks a new era for American cement production, one where technology turns emissions into a high-quality product the market needs while creating lasting local jobs,” said Ryan Gilliam, CEO and co-founder of Fortera. “Building alongside the largest lime operation in the Americas lets us turn an existing emissions stream into hundreds of thousands of tons of cement to meet demand that already exists.”

This project is also significant for the lime industry because it provides a scalable solution to capture and re-use CO2 released by limestone during calcination, which generates roughly 60% of scope-1 emissions. The National Lime Association (NLA) aims to decarbonize the U.S. lime industry by 2050; meeting that goal requires innovation in low carbon technologies.

“While MLC has reduced our carbon footprint by 8% since 2022, and I am proud of that progress, current technologies will only take us so far. Lime producers need practical solutions to capture calcination emissions,” said Paul Hogan, CEO of MLC and current serving president of the NLA. “Fortera has developed an innovative approach that not only reduces the amount of carbon we release — it also turns it into a valuable product.”

The cement manufactured at the Ste. Genevieve plant is planned to be used across the Midwest, including by Ozinga, a fifth-generation, family-owned concrete and building materials company.

“Scaling the next generation of cement requires more than innovative technology; it requires strong partnerships across our industry,” said Marty Ozinga, CEO of Ozinga. “Fortera’s ongoing work with Ozinga represents the kind of collaboration needed to bring lower-carbon cement solutions to commercial scale while strengthening domestic manufacturing and ensuring we can continue to deliver the performance and reliability our customers expect.”

About Fortera
Fortera is revolutionizing the global construction industry. The company’s proprietary ReCarb technology integrates seamlessly with existing cement and lime facilities, allowing partners to keep their kilns, make full use of their limestone, and leverage their established distribution networks. Fortera’s breakthrough approach transforms waste CO₂ into productive feedstock, enabling plants to produce more from existing resources. The company has proven it can produce cement at cost parity with portland cement while cutting CO₂ emissions by 70%. Fortera operates a 15,000 ton per year facility in Redding, California, regularly placing product in real-world commercial projects, and is executing on a global commercial pipeline that includes the 300,000 ton per year Fortera Cement Plant in Ste. Genevieve, Missouri. For more information on how Fortera delivers proven, cost-competitive, and deployable low-carbon cement technology worldwide, visit forteraglobal.com.

About MLC
For over a century, critical industries have relied on Mississippi Lime Company, LLC (“MLC”) to provide the highest purity lime and calcium products, backed by the most advanced technical services and patented equipment. Lime solutions from MLC play an essential role in drinking water treatment, pollution control, agriculture, and the production of steel, glass, paper, polymers, raw materials, foods, and beverages. MLC has built its reputation on an unwavering commitment to safety, service and performance. The company’s expanding global footprint includes a diversified, reliable network of production and distribution facilities in the U.S. and U.K. MLC is an HBM Holdings company headquartered in St. Louis, Mo.

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SOURCE MLC