About

Qatalyst was founded in Vancouver in 1985 as FWCO. Its first project evaluated a cultural tourism pilot for Vancouver and Victoria. The firm incorporated as FWCO Management Consultants Ltd. in 2005, aligned with Goss Gilroy Inc. in 2016 to work as part of a national firm, and became Qatalyst Research Group on May 1, 2020. By 2020 it had completed more than 700 projects.

FWCO became Qatalyst in 2020 to reflect a new focus and operating model. At the start of the pandemic the firm reviewed what it did and how, and made three commitments: work with clients dedicated to making the world better, provide services that track and improve the effectiveness of their work, and bring multi-disciplinary teams together quickly using its own tools and technology.

Qatalyst works with federal, provincial, territorial, local and Indigenous governments, as well as non-profits, post-secondary institutions, industry associations and businesses. Clients named in its case studies include the First Nations Health Authority, FedDev Ontario, Prairies Economic Development Canada, Alberta Innovates and the Government of Yukon. In 2025 the firm completed 40 projects and worked with over 30 First Nations communities. See the case studies.

Qatalyst is both: a management consulting firm with its own in-house software development team. Since 2021 it has built more than eight software solutions for clients, including an employment tracker for go2HR and an impact visualization for the Arctic Inspiration Prize. Since 2023 it has built more than ten AI tools for research and client work, and it runs its operations on its own platform, Qatalink.