The provincial support of the support fund is aimed at “catalyzing” the fluctuations of the preliminary preliminary market.
The supplement of the European venture company Telegraph Hill Capital has created a new fund at an early stage in Quebke to support local startups of artificial intelligence.
Telegraph enterprises He announced the launch of his fund, along with almost 35 million dollars in the first closure of financing from the Quebec government through the investment of Quebec, TERARIS CAPATAL, Inovia Capital and more than 40 entrepreneurs and family offices. The fund plans to reach $ 40 million before the end of the year.
“We need more options for the founders. We need more competition between venture capital. ”
Etienne Merino
Telegraph enterprises
General Partner Etienne Merino will manage the fund from Quebec with the support of Telegraph Hill partners Luis Gutierres Roy and Varun Dalal in Barcelona. Partners plan to rely on previous successes in the region: investments in startups in Montreal Chronogolf And Quotemachine ended with acquisitions by a local company at a local point of services and e -commerce Lightspeed. Although Telegraph Ventures is an independent organization, the European company will share in the return.
Gutierres Roy attributed the success of Telegraph Hill in Quebec “Quality and Global Ambitions of Entrepreneurs and the joint nature of the VK community.”
Thanks to the support from the public sector, the Telegraph Ventures Quebec also hopes to fill out a gap in preliminary seeds and seed financing for technological startups. On a national scale, the landscape for the early scene was gloomy: Recent report From Canadian venture capital and private investment associations (CVCA) found a 16 percent drop in dollars and a 28 percent decline in transactions at these stages compared to a year earlier.
Merino said that he had difficulties, attracting funds in Quebec with first -hand, even before the VK market slowed down after 2022. He founded a heyed startup with AI, which was later Purchased by the Hootsuite social networks company In 2021 for $ 60 million.
“We need more options for the founders,” Merino said. “We need more competition between VCS.”
CONNECTED: Canadian VC Pre -seeded and seeds continued to subside in H1 2025
The universal aiming fund for aiming startups creating “useful” artificial intelligence tools for enterprises. Despite the startups of AI Obtaining a greater share investment in Canada, experts warned about Growing bubble and studies showing pilot projects of artificial intelligence, bringing poor performance results
Merino said that he was interested in companies that do not see AI as a “brilliant object”. Rather, he is looking for startups focused on a certain vertical, whose product improves over time, since it collects more customer data.
“This is where I think that these companies can become more protected because entering the market [strategy] And the distribution will become a moat, ”Merino said.
Given the base of the limited partner of Telegraph Ventures (LP), most of the capital will be intended for Québec, although Merino said that it is open to support the founders of Québec, which are moving to another place. “Telegraph will help the founders of Québec to scaldle faster and smarter with global thinking,” said Terrys Capital Beatrice Couture, director of Terrys Capital Beatrice. Terryys invests in funds as LP with the support of the federal government as part of the initiative of the venture capitalist, the Québec La Caisse pension fund and other institutional investors.
Merino said that Telegraph plans to invest in approximately 30 companies at the stage of preliminary seed and seeds, with the sizes of checks for half a million up to 750,000 dollars, as well as reserves for subsequent rounds. He intends for Telegraph to conduct price rounds – something, that Mérineau and other VCS I agree to be absent In the ecosystem.
Telegraph Ventures raised funds over the past one and a half years LPS dealt with lower liquidity And infrequently invested in funds with less experience. Inovia Capital has invested in its Discovery Foundation, which is aimed at the first fund managers.
“Discovery was looking for funds that, in our opinion, could cataly up the preliminary market of Quebec,” said Marianna Dubois, the manager of the Discovery Fund Inovia Foundation. “We believe that the combination of Luis's experience with the network of Etienne operators … will do just that.”
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