Plans to progressively raise user fees over the past 5 years have been deferred on a yearly basis in order to ensure the G2N clean room remained an affordable resource for the research community at the University of Waterloo.
During that time, we have absorbed the rising costs for lab supplies and for equipment repairs.
Rising costs and salary expenses make it necessary to raise lab fees at this time. You may have observed that fees for external users were increased on our website about 4 weeks ago. We are announcing at this time that user fees for academic lab users will be increasing by $200 per term beginning in September (to $1800/term). A further increase of $100/term is anticipated, to be implemented beginning in January of 2016.
During the coming weeks, our hourly rates will be reviewed and increased to reflect the increase in lab operating costs.