Heylist, Vosyn, Pok Pok and Ability Biologics have all raised new funding.
The final Collision conference, set to take place in Toronto, officially kicked off today with multiple Canadian tech startups announcing new funding rounds ranging from seed to Series A.
The series of announcements today came from Montreal-based startups Heylist and Ability Biologics. Toronto-based startups Vosyn and Pok Pok also announced new funding rounds.
Founded in 2022 by CEO Vicky Boudreau, chief experience officer Nicolas LeBlanc and CTO Alexandre Borgia, Heylist operates a marketplace that connects brands and agencies with “nano-influencers,” social media users who have extremely high engagement rates but fewer than 10,000 followers.
The startup announced that it has secured $1.6 million in its first funding round with Collision, led by Accelia Capital, with participation from The51, Anges Québec and the Government of Quebec through its Impulsion PME program.
Boudreau said Haylist’s team is made up of 70 percent women and that the company is proud to be backed by Accelia and The51, which support women in tech.
Haylist said the funding will be used to develop the product and support sales growth in Canada and the United States, and will benefit from a network of strategic angel investors in its target markets in Canada and the United States.
Founded in 2023 by CEO Brian Armstrong and President Andile Holder, Vosyn is leveraging its presence in Collision to announce it has secured $2.2 million of a targeted $8 million seed round. The startup aims to use artificial intelligence (AI) models to provide real-time language translation across video, audio, text and applications.
Vosyn said it has already secured a $2 million pre-seed round and aims to hold an IPO in 2025.
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Meanwhile, outside of the conference, drug discovery startup Ability Biologics announced it had completed a seed funding extension, bringing its total seed funding to $18 million (CAD$24.7 million). Ability emerged from stealth in December to raise $12 million for its AbiLeap discovery engine, which uses generative AI to discover and develop antibody therapeutics for cancer and immune system diseases.
Ability is backed by founding investors Amplitude Ventures, Fonds de solidarité FTQ, Investissement Québec, Charles River Laboratories, Theodorus and Alexandria Venture Investments.
“Ability’s proprietary platform stands out as an intelligent way to rapidly develop selective, potent and ultra-targeted biologics to improve efficacy and patient outcomes,” Dion Madsen, partner and co-founder at Amplitude, said in a statement.
Finally, EdTech startup Pok Pok secured $6 million in Series A funding led by Adjacent with participation from Konvoy Ventures, MetaLab Ventures, and Banana Capital. The round also saw participation from notable angel investors such as Michelle Kennedy, founder of female-centric social app Peanut, and Brandon Leonardo, co-founder of Instacart.
Related: Snowman Games Studio spinout PokPok raises CAD 3.9M to help kids learn through play
Co-founder Melissa Cash told BetaKit that PokPok secured part of the round for its second female-led close, which inspired former BDC partner Julie McGill to launch her own “Julie Change” fund to invest in women-led startups from Series A onwards.
“Pok Pok is my catalyst for launching a fund I’ve been thinking about for years – my commitment to breaking down the barriers women face in accessing, advancing and accumulating capital,” McGill said in a statement. “We are thrilled to partner with Pok Pok, a company led by two incredible women and excelling at driving capital-efficient growth.”
PokPok said it plans to use the funding to launch its app for Android devices, which Cash said has a waiting list of “thousands of families.” PokPok also plans to use the funding to introduce STEM-based product extensions to help kids build fundamental early classroom skills in subjects like math, chemistry, physics and biology.
Led by two mothers, Pok Pok spun out of Toronto game studio Snowman and offers play-based, educational mobile games for kids ages 2 to 6. The startup secured C$3.9 million (US$3 million) in seed funding from games-focused venture capital firms in June 2022 to ramp up sales and marketing efforts. The company is backed by Tiny Capital and Lightspeed founder Dax Dasilva, among others.
Feature image provided by Heylist.
