Written by James Adair & Kyla Perry – July 16, 2026
In 2020, after decades of government budget cuts had plunged Canada’s post-secondary institutions into a financial crisis, the University of Alberta hired a consulting firm to find a way to slash its costs. The firm, called the Nous Group, had earned a name in its home country of Australia as experts in finding “cost efficiencies” inside austerity-riddled universities.
That name was “Nousferatu”—coined by one Australian MLA because of Nous’s reputation for being “this kind of vampire that comes into universities, sucks them dry and leaves them worse off for teachers and students.”
The University of Alberta (U of A) was just the first university in Canada to hire Nous Group to conduct restructuring. Nous has now worked with more than 20 Canadian universities, including many in Ontario, thanks to significant support from the Doug Ford government. Its cookie-cutter model—slashing staff and services, amalgamating faculties, replacing humans with online portals—has brought accusations that the firm is pushing public institutions toward a corporate model. Now, it’s looking to expand into another weakened public sector in Canada: health care.
Nous has quietly become one of Canada’s foremost enforcers of austerity in institutions that are broke, vulnerable, and desperate for solutions.
The Nous Formula
The U of A was in a dire situation: the year before, the Alberta government had cut the grant it provided to the university, which meant the university was looking at a net loss of about $135 million.
So it sought out Nous (pronounced like “mouse”) for a restructuring built around $95 million in projected savings. In the internal document Nous prepared for the university in July 2020, the firm proposed two main reforms: cutting some of the university’s 18 faculties, and amalgamating administrative services.
“There will likely be substantial opposition,” Nous wrote, “which is not always a strong argument to stop.”
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