Canada's VC ecosystem is smaller and more concentrated than it looks on paper. Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver account for the vast majority of seed activity, and the investor community is tight-knit—everyone knows everyone. This works in your favor if you can get a warm intro, but cold outreach tends to fall flat. Many Canadian funds have explicit mandates to back local founders or companies with Canadian operations, often tied to government incentives or LP requirements. If you're not incorporated in Canada or don't have meaningful presence there, confirm upfront whether a fund can actually write you a check. Also worth knowing: US investor participation in Canadian seed rounds has dropped significantly over the past two years, meaning domestic capital is doing more of the heavy lifting. Competition for that capital is real.

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Sector-wise, ICT and AI dominate seed activity, but life sciences and cleantech have carved out meaningful niches with investors who understand long development cycles. If you're building in fintech, SaaS, or digital health, you'll find pattern recognition here—Canada has produced enough exits in these categories that investors speak the language. One structural quirk: BDC (the government's development bank) is a co-investor in a huge percentage of Canadian deals, either directly or through fund-of-funds. This isn't a bad thing, but it means many funds are deploying with some government capital behind them, which can affect follow-on dynamics and timeline expectations. Average seed rounds run around $2-3M CAD, smaller than US equivalents, so calibrate your ask accordingly.