A Record-Setting Year for Equity Funding in Atlantic Canada
The year 2016 was a tremendous year for the funding of startups in Atlantic Canada – maybe the best ever.
According to data collected by Entrevestor, Atlantic Canadian startups raised $73.3-million in 2016 from venture capital, strategic and angel investors. That’s up by about one-third from $55.5-million in 2015.
And the great thing was that the deals came in a broad range of shapes and sizes – a few investors (note the plural) from Silicon Valley, investments by super angels, and a swath of funding by local institutions.
Each year, Entrevestor collects and analyzes data on the startup community across Atlantic Canada, and equity funding is one of the closely studied portions of the study. Startup entrepreneurs and their supporters love funding data as it’s considered – rightly or wrongly – a barometer for the health of the startup community. And the data from 2016 suggest the East Coast community is healthy indeed.
What was exceptional about 2016 was that there were so many companies bringing in $3 million in funding, especially from outside the region.
“The recent participation of ‘super angels’ like John Risley in the local start-up scene, along with deeper funding commitments by well-capitalized VCs like Build Ventures, have contributed to the increasing average deal size,” said Gregg Phipps, Managing Director of Investment at Innovacorp. “It’s a positive development, for certain.”
Read more about this story in Entrevestor.