Alex Norman

🇨🇦 For the Canadian tech ecosystem to rise above its potential, the pre-seed venture financings will need to more than double to create a meaningful pipeline of growth-stage companies in the future. ➡️ Read the full report below Panache Ventures is excited to release its 2025 Startup Formation Report — a data-driven look at new startup activity across Canada. We are proud to back visionary Canadian founders from day one. 🇨🇦 🚀 🦄

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⏩ State of early stage funding in Canada - a helpful lens 💡 At Panache Ventures, we've spent time building a robust dataset looking at YoY and QoQ startup formation in Canada, a demand-side indicator of what to expect in the coming 12-24 months. Latest trends across provinces, the role AI is increasingly playing in startup creation and the make-up of our Canadian founder pool. CC : Prashant Matta, Inshaal Qadir, Domenic Del Vecchio and Alessia Priolo. ➡️ Read the full report below

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What's the Role of AI in New Startup Formation? - Nearly 90% of AI startups formed are in the application layer. - There is momentum in AI infrastructure, with ~11% startups focused on pushing forward the fast-evolving AI tech stack. - Little activity at the foundational layer. This presents a potential opportunity as the cost to build and scale reduces over time. More below ⬇️

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Love this profile of six great Canadian start-ups from University of Toronto (including Staircase Ventures-backed MedEssist | Transforming Pharmacy through Tech and AI!). There are incredible, globally-relevant companies that were born in Toronto but are scaling internationally.

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Stableminded, a financial podcast covering founders on the frontier. Long form, founder-focused. All about modern money. New episode drops next week. Ep. 45 - Charles Yoo-Naut, Co-Founder & CTO at Rain Ep. 46 - Louis Amira, CEO at Circuit & Chisel building ATXP Ep. 47 - Nikhil Srinivasan, CEO & Co-Founder at Infinite Presented by Altitude Hosted by Drew Rogers EP: 0045-47 SF, USA

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Canada just had one of its most quietly explosive funding weeks — and nobody’s talking about it. So we did. From AI to climate, fintech infra to robotics, Canadian founders didn’t just raise capital… they raised conviction. Investors backed real problems, real markets, and real revenue — not “AI but with vibes.” Here’s what stood out this week (Nov 30–Dec 6): 🇨🇦 Canada funded actual builders — Deeptech with customers — Climate tech with measurable impact — Fintech infra powering real payments — Robotics + automation companies replacing manual processes — Healthcare platforms solving real bottlenecks No hype. No wishful thinking. Just execution over ego. The full breakdown includes: 📌 Every funded startup 📌 Who backed them 📌 How much they raised 📌 One-line explanation of what they’re building 📌 Market insights investors won’t say out loud 📌 The trendlines shaping Canada’s 2025–26 VC landscape If you're a founder, investor, or operator… this week's Canada edition is a must-read. 👉 Full Newsletter: https://lnkd.in/ebYDBuSh CREDX Letters — raw. real. founder & investor first.

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💡 The Panache Ventures team just released our Canada Reboots report, diving into how startup formation is evolving across the country. H1 2025 saw BC’s startup formation dip nearly 50% y-o-y – a reminder that continued early-stage support is critical to keep Canada’s innovation engine running.

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When experienced founders and investors highlight NL’s tech momentum, it’s not noise — it’s a signal. In this CBC article, founders Adam Keating and Brent Pretty and VC investor Chris Moyer highlight the strength of the ecosystem — the ambition of local companies, the growth trajectory, and the confidence they see in what’s being built here. The NL tech sector is now a $1.87B+ contributor to the province’s economy. Companies are scaling, raising capital, and competing globally from Newfoundland and Labrador. It’s also the #1 startup ecosystem in Atlantic Canada. Momentum is real. The opportunity now is to build on it — and accelerate. 🔗 https://lnkd.in/gJ33PHDE #NLTech #Innovation #technology #EconomicGrowth techNL

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There are many reports analyzing the state of early stage funding in Canada - a helpful lens in understanding the supply side of Canada's innovation landscape. At Panache Ventures, we've also spent time building a robust dataset looking at YoY and QoQ startup formation in Canada, a demand-side indicator of what to expect in the coming 12-24 months. 🚀 This year's report, our second edition, looks at the latest trends across provinces, the role AI is increasingly playing in startup creation, and the make-up of our Canadian founder pool that is increasingly global. 🇨🇦 Proud to collaborate with my colleagues Prashant Matta and Inshaal Qadir on this data-driven thought leadership piece. Shoutout to Alessia Priolo on our team for packaging these insights into a cool consumable report ➡️ Read the full report below DM me if you'd like to learn more and discuss! Founders - let's keep building #startups #startupformation #canada #tech

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In case you missed it: we released a comprehensive Deep Dive mapping Alberta's 2025 startup and investment ecosystem. The interactive report includes:  → Analysis of 2,995 active companies and US$870M+ in capital raised across 148 transactions → Funding stage patterns and what they reveal about ecosystem maturity → Shifts in capital composition, including a 163% surge in domestic investment  → Sector breakdowns with energy leading and AI active across 17 industries  → Provincial comparisons showing Alberta's position as Canada's 4th largest innovation hub Explore the full report now: https://lnkd.in/gSazWGgr #AlbertaTech #ABtech #Alberta #Tech #Innovation #Startup #Investor #VentureCapital #StartupEcosystem #YYCtech #YEGtech

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💡 BDC Commits Another $200 Million CAD to Catalyze Industrial Tech Innovation in Canada We’re witnessing a pivotal moment in Canadian venture capital: The Business Development Bank of Canada (BDC) has recommitted $200 million CAD through its Second Industrial Innovation Venture Fund, targeting transformative early-stage startups serving legacy sectors—from AgTech and advanced manufacturing to mining, oil & gas, and food tech—leveraging robotics, AI, and industrial software solutions. This marks a continuation of the momentum sparked by its $250 million Fund I, now with an expanded focus on critical minerals, a cornerstone of Canada’s economic sovereignty and clean energy transition. Why This Matters: 1. Bridging Canada’s Innovation Gap: BDC recognizes the productivity shortfall across sectors such as manufacturing, mining, and agriculture and is stepping in where private capital remains cautious. 2. Ecosystem Momentum: Fund II builds on prior successes—BDC’s first Industrial Innovation Fund backed firms like 4AG Robotics, BinSentry, MineSense, Precision AI, and others—reinforcing investor confidence in industrial tech. 3. Strategic Focus on Critical Minerals: This reflects a timely pivot toward domains essential to both global supply chains and Canada’s national interests. 4. Responding to a Cooling VC Environment: With Canadian venture activity down in H1 2025 amid macroeconomic and geopolitical turbulence, BDC’s new fund represents a steady, counter-cyclical capital source. To Founders in Canada’s Industrial Tech Ecosystem If your venture is developing applied AI, robotics, or software solutions for capital-intensive industrial sectors—or mining innovations serving the critical minerals value chain—BDC’s Fund II may be the capital catalyst you need. 📩 Trusted Financial Is Here to Help At Trusted Financial, we specialize in advising growth-stage companies navigating the raising of Series A and beyond. Whether you’re preparing for a VC raise, strategic round, or need to communicate your value proposition around themes like industrial transformation or critical minerals, our team offers: • Strategic fundraising advisory tailored to early industrial tech ventures • Capital introduction and lead placement—connecting you with BDC, institutional VCs, family offices, and strategic partners • Pitch and narrative optimization—shaping your story to resonate with the evolving innovation capital landscape Empowering founders is our purpose. If you’re exploring your next round of funding, especially with a differentiated industrial tech or critical minerals focus, let’s talk. Reach out to Trusted Financial today—let’s fuel the future of Canadian industrial innovation together. https://lnkd.in/gv-nUFi https://lnkd.in/gHDX2X6S

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A little peek inside ChaiTech ✨ The ChaiTech Accelerator is an 8-week in-person program in Toronto that supports Jewish founders of early-stage tech startups. In partnership with Prosserman JCC and Schulich School of Business - York University, founders learn from mentors like Uri Levine (Waze), Brad Feld (Techstars), and Neil Grunberg (Storytime Capital) and more.. As Lead EIR, I get to match experienced builders with early-stage founders and it’s such rewarding work. Learn more → chaitech.ca #Startups #Accelerator #Community Daniel Warner, Kelly Yefet, Elana Ostrega, Kim Parnell Chris Carder

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I hate to argue with the Canadian Venture Capital & Private Equity Association (CVCA) on this but, not sure how they view this as “a healthy, stable” Canadian VC market." So, three things 1. The data as presented is unfortunately wrong and misleading. How can that be you ask? Well, it includes $837M of secondary or buyout transactions that while providing great liquidity to the investors who participated, are NOT primary investments. These transactions should have been recorded only as exits on the VC ledger and then they should have been recorded as investments in the PE/Buyout ledger. 2. So when you remove $837M from the primary VC investment column (i.e. capital that truly supports the growth and scaling of a business vs simply facilitating a change of ownership) it drops to ~4.05B vs $4.9B a 17% decline - kind of material, and it means we are running at about 60% of 2024 which as we all know was not a particularly great year. 3. Finally, when you compare US VC financing activity vs CDN VC financing activity the only thing that they have in common is that deal volume is down. In fact, while YTD 2025 VC investment activity in the US has virtually returned to 2021 levels (yes, the mix and type of companies funded has indeed materially changed) the investment levels in the Canada are continuing to head down and to the right. In fact, with VC investments YTD in Canada being C$4B and the US being ~US240B, Canada is at 1.25% of US levels and per capital investment on innovation and the next generation economy is $73 per CDN citizen and $701 per US citizen - OUCH So, at least to me, nothing about this year feels healthy or particularly stable and if we as a country want to compete globally it is going to be very hard to do so investing 1/10th the amount per citizen vs our neighbours to the south

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We closed $1.1M to solve the most expensive problem in cross-border commerce: logistics inefficiency. The problem: Businesses scaling internationally hit a wall. Shipping takes too long. Costs are too high. Deliveries are unpredictable. This caps growth. What we built: Year 1-2: A marketplace connecting businesses to transporters. Got to 6,000+ businesses, 25,000+ transporters, clients like PepsiCo. Year 3: Adrian AI—turning logistics data into predictive intelligence. Every shipment teaches our models to match better carriers, predict better routes, optimize pricing. Result: 30% faster delivery, 20% cost reduction, 95% on-time rates. The unlock: Banks can't finance most of these businesses—no collateral, no credit history. But we have something banks don't: logistics performance data. So we built Boo$T—trade finance powered by shipment data. 80% of our users are now accessing capital they couldn't get before. Why this works: Fix the logistics problem first. Generate proprietary data as a byproduct. Use that data to solve the financing problem. Two revenue streams, one platform. What's next: Scaling our AI-powered logistics infrastructure and expanding embedded finance to more businesses. Grateful to Morgan Stanley Inclusive & Sustainable Ventures, Orbit Ventures, Digital Africa, Expert Dojo, Google for Startups and several other notable angels for backing this vision. To the Ridelink team: I'm incredibly proud of what we've built together. Your relentless execution made this possible. This is just the beginning. To our customers and partners: Your trust and feedback shaped this platform. Thank you for growing with us. Let's keep shipping. Full story: https://lnkd.in/dgeDP3gw

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I haven’t posted on LinkedIn about Billdr in a long time. Today feels like the right moment. I’m thrilled to share that we’ve raised USD $3.2M to accelerate our mission of building the dominant operating system for small and mid-sized general contractors and home builders (SMB GCs). The round is led by White Star Capital, with participation from One Way Ventures, Desjardins Capital, asterX, and Formentera Capital. This milestone is more than a funding round. It’s the closing of one chapter, and the exciting beginning of another. The truth is, the last few years were hard. We spent 3.5 years trying to build a home renovation marketplace that ultimately didn’t scale. We made the difficult decision to shut it down, reset the company, and change direction. Over the last two years, we rebuilt Billdr from its ashes as a vertical SaaS for SMB GCs, one feature at a time. We earned trust one SMB GC at a time. We survived the valley of death, and we emerged much stronger. Today, our vertical SaaS Billdr PRO serves hundreds of SMB GCs across the US and Canada, representing thousands of construction professionals using our software daily. Over $1B of construction projects flow through our platform. Thousands of workers rely on our software and mobile app every month. That comes with a real responsibility: to build software that genuinely makes a GC’s life easier in the back office and significantly increases their productivity. Our core belief is simple: SMB GCs don’t need more tools. They need one modern, intuitive, AI-native operating system, bringing estimating, project management, team management, payments, communications, and procurement under one roof. There are 1.4M SMB GCs in North America, delivering $1T+ in construction projects annually (residential and commercial). Yet, 75% of them are still using a combination of Excel, spreadsheets, and accounting software. We have a huge opportunity ahead of us to unlock productivity gains across this industry. Grateful to our investors, our customers, and the Billdr team! It's time to build. You can read more on our blog post here: https://lnkd.in/gzQZnXGt

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Canada’s startup ecosystem is evolving fast — and leaders like Matt Wilson, Managing Partner of Allied Venture Partners, are pushing innovation forward with a fresh, data-driven approach to early-stage investing. In this episode, we dive into: 🚀 What makes Canada’s next-gen VC landscape different 💡 How Allied Venture Partners identifies breakout founders 📈 The investment trends shaping Canada’s tech future 🤝 Why collaborative, community-driven capital is changing the game If you’re an investor, founder, or simply curious about the future of venture capital, this conversation is a must-listen. https://lnkd.in/eFFBDAzv #VentureCapital #StartupEcosystem #CanadaTech #EmergingManagers #InvestingInsights #AlliedVenturePartners #Podetize

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Canada’s early-stage capital pipeline is at an inflection point. For almost 15 years at TandemLaunch, I’ve seen firsthand how difficult it can be for Canadian founders to raise their first rounds of financing, especially in deep tech innovation, where companies often need capital before revenue, traction, or even a finished product. That’s why I’m looking forward to participating in the NACO national roundtable tomorrow (February 19, 11:00 AM ET) to discuss the early-stage funding gap in Canada and how we can strengthen the capital pipeline that supports innovation from the very beginning. After working alongside so many founders taking their first leap, this conversation feels especially important to me. Almost 1000 people have already registered. Clearly this is a conversation the ecosystem is ready to have.

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How to think about the founder who won’t take “No.” for an answer. Regulatory barrier? They find a workaround. Technical limitation? They build around it. Market rejection? They pivot the approach. Funding door slams? They find another way in. Too many investors see this and think, "Difficult. Stubborn. Won't listen." I see it differently, "Problem solver. Unstoppable. Will find a way." The smooth-talking sales founder who charms everyone is often the bigger risk. The enthusiasm and charisma is great for getting funding, but doesn’t always translate to the ability to find their way around barriers. When building a startup, finding ways around barriers is the single most important skill. Don’t give up on the first, “No.” The founder who sees barriers as challenges to overcome... that's who builds something special.

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