Key Takeaways
- • Canada's private capital ecosystem is actively seeking regulatory and policy reforms to attract foreign institutional investment into mid-market deals, with executives from leading tech firms including Cohere, Wealthsimple, Waabi, and Xanadu Quantum publicly advocating for barrier removal at the CVCA's Canadian Global Growth Forum on September 15, 2026.
- • Geopolitical trade tensions are being reframed as a strategic opportunity by institutional investors; Cyrus Madon, executive chairman of Brookfield's private equity group, characterized current trade dynamics as "the greatest gift that anybody could have given our country," forcing focus on capital attraction and GDP growth.
- • The CVCA convened hundreds of national investors, foreign capital providers, and politicians alongside a UAE delegation for structured investment meetings, signaling coordinated efforts to facilitate cross-border capital deployment in Canadian mid-market opportunities rather than large-scale infrastructure projects.
- • Key infrastructure for deal facilitation includes reducing regulatory barriers, improving regulatory certainty, and accelerating approval timelines—challenges that represent material impediments to foreign institutional capital deployment in the Canadian market.
- • Cohere CEO Aidan Gomez emphasized Canada's positioning as a "trustworthy partner" for AI investment, positioning domestic AI firms as alternatives to U.S. technology giants while noting that "a culture change is needed" for Canada to be sufficiently ambitious in capital attraction.
Summary
Canada's private capital community is mounting a coordinated push to remove regulatory and policy barriers impeding foreign institutional investment in domestic mid-market transactions. The Canadian Venture Capital and Private Equity Association (CVCA) hosted its Canadian Global Growth Forum in Toronto on September 15, 2026, drawing hundreds of institutional investors, foreign capital providers, politicians, and prominent Canadian founders to address structural impediments to capital deployment.
The forum, positioned as a prominent ancillary event to Prime Minister Mark Carney's Canada Investment Summit, concentrated on mid-market deal opportunities that constitute the primary deal flow in Canadian capital markets—a strategic counterweight to the summit's focus on large-scale infrastructure projects. Attendees included CEOs from Wealthsimple Financial Corp., Cohere Inc., Waabi Innovation Inc., and Xanadu Quantum Technologies Ltd., alongside a UAE delegation conducting closed-door investment meetings facilitated by the CVCA.
Regulatory and operational efficiency emerged as critical pain points. According to conference participants represented in publisher communications, the primary challenges center on reducing barriers, improving regulatory certainty, and accelerating approval timelines—mechanisms essential to enabling capital deployment at scale. Cyrus Madon, executive chairman of Brookfield's private equity group, reframed current geopolitical conditions as beneficial: the ongoing trade war is "forcing us to focus on what really matters," including capital attraction and GDP growth.
Cohere CEO Aidan Gomez positioned Canada as a differentiated investment destination, citing the country's reputation as "a very trustworthy partner" and emphasizing the strategic value of protecting this brand positioning in global AI markets. However, Gomez also signaled that institutional ambition requires evolution—"a culture change is needed" for Canada to compete effectively for foreign capital in high-growth technology sectors. The conference structure, including curated investor-founder meetings and international delegation engagement, indicates the private capital association is executing a targeted strategy to lower transactional friction and accelerate capital flows into Canadian mid-market enterprises.
The forum, positioned as a prominent ancillary event to Prime Minister Mark Carney's Canada Investment Summit, concentrated on mid-market deal opportunities that constitute the primary deal flow in Canadian capital markets—a strategic counterweight to the summit's focus on large-scale infrastructure projects. Attendees included CEOs from Wealthsimple Financial Corp., Cohere Inc., Waabi Innovation Inc., and Xanadu Quantum Technologies Ltd., alongside a UAE delegation conducting closed-door investment meetings facilitated by the CVCA.
Regulatory and operational efficiency emerged as critical pain points. According to conference participants represented in publisher communications, the primary challenges center on reducing barriers, improving regulatory certainty, and accelerating approval timelines—mechanisms essential to enabling capital deployment at scale. Cyrus Madon, executive chairman of Brookfield's private equity group, reframed current geopolitical conditions as beneficial: the ongoing trade war is "forcing us to focus on what really matters," including capital attraction and GDP growth.
Cohere CEO Aidan Gomez positioned Canada as a differentiated investment destination, citing the country's reputation as "a very trustworthy partner" and emphasizing the strategic value of protecting this brand positioning in global AI markets. However, Gomez also signaled that institutional ambition requires evolution—"a culture change is needed" for Canada to compete effectively for foreign capital in high-growth technology sectors. The conference structure, including curated investor-founder meetings and international delegation engagement, indicates the private capital association is executing a targeted strategy to lower transactional friction and accelerate capital flows into Canadian mid-market enterprises.
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