Startup roundup: Wealthsimple $425M, Solink US$100M

Toronto fintech Wealthsimple, Ottawa security-video company Solink and Montreal software maker Coveo led a week of Canadian funding and deal news from Oct. 27 to Nov. 3, with the federal government’s planned stake in Cohere setting the backdrop.

Wealthsimple said Oct. 27 that it has agreed to up to $425 million in new financing at a $13.8-billion post-money valuation, up from $10 billion a year earlier. The round is led by Singapore’s GIC and includes Power Corp. of Canada, IGM Financial, Iconiq, the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board and Inovia Capital. It includes $300 million in new equity and $125 million in shares bought from employees, BetaKit reported. Our earlier story has the full details.

Ottawa-based Solink said Thursday it has raised more than US$100 million in a round led by Toronto private equity firm Vertu Capital, with Goldman Sachs Alternatives, Golub Growth and Comcast Ventures taking part. The company turns store security cameras into business data and says its platform runs in more than 35,000 locations in 65 countries. Solink did not disclose a valuation. See our report on the Solink round.

Also on Thursday, Montreal-based Coveo, which is listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange, announced it had bought Anglera, a Y Combinator alum based in Silicon Valley, for an undisclosed amount. Anglera extracts product details such as dimensions and materials, which Coveo plans to feed into its AI commerce search. The company said part of the price is contingent on performance into early 2028. Our story on the deal covers the quarterly results released alongside it, and BetaKit also reported it.

Among early-stage companies, Toronto’s Bot Food Corporation announced Thursday it had secured $1.5 million in pre-seed funding from Toronto’s GreenSky Ventures. The startup, founded by the team that built and sold Wysdom, is building a personal context library that people can use across AI products and control themselves. The seven-person company said it will put most of the money toward go-to-market testing, according to BetaKit.

Montreal’s Bloomsco also announced Thursday a $1-million pre-seed round from BDC Capital’s Seed Venture Fund and Montreal-based Telegraph Ventures. The company is developing software that defence contractors can use to turn technical manuals and product specifications into training materials for the military. BetaKit reported that Bloomsco has already secured a contract with the Department of National Defence to create a qualification standard and training plan for an officer role, and that it will use the funding to grow its engineering team and refine its technology for classified and air-gapped environments. The story is here.

At the DMZ Black Innovation Summit in Toronto, 10 Black-led startups pitched to more than 300 guests last week. DMZ, the incubator housed inside Toronto Metropolitan University, awarded the top prize of $100,000 in investment to edtech platform Hey Cleo. Three winners took home a combined $170,000, BetaKit reported.

The week’s largest number came from Ottawa. On Oct. 29, BetaKit reported that the federal government plans to buy a stake in Toronto-based Cohere through a planned $7-billion Series E at a $36-billion valuation. Cohere then said Monday it will invest more than $4 billion in Canadian research, development and AI infrastructure through 2031 and create more than 1,500 jobs, according to our report. AI Minister Evan Solomon has said the Cohere stake will not be Ottawa’s last in a Canadian technology company.

The finance minister has hinted that the upcoming federal budget will be all about entrepreneurs, BetaKit reported Monday.

Amounts are in Canadian dollars unless noted. This roundup draws on company announcements as reported by BetaKit and has not independently verified each figure. Check back next Tuesday for the next edition.

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Sources: BetaKit; Business Wire (Solink); company announcements as reported.