Unleashing the Power of CVCA Intelligence

CVCA’s public quarterly market overview reports provide a deep analysis of the Canadian market, offering a panoramic view of private capital trends and investments. These comprehensive reports utilize data from the CVCA Intelligence platform, Canada’s foremost private capital database. They highlight performance indicators, emerging sectors, and strategic shifts, empowering stakeholders with crucial insights for informed decision-making.

Q1 2026 at a glance:

In Q1 2026, CAD $936.3M was invested across 104 venture capital transactions, compared to 178 transactions at $3.97B in Q4 2025 and a five-year Q1 average of 171 transactions. Deal count was the lowest recorded in any quarter since 2017. Capital deployed was below recent Q1 levels but above the pre-2021 Q1 range. Average deal size in Q1 2026 was CAD $9.00M.

Stage-level distribution in Q1 2026 was concentrated at earlier stages of the investment cycle. Pre-seed and seed investment totaled CAD $185.3M across 54 transactions, representing 19.8% of quarterly capital against a five-year Q1 average of approximately 9%. Seed average deal size was $4.48M against a five-year average of $3.27M. Early stage totaled $466.1M across 29 transactions at an average of $16.07M. Later stage totaled $248.4M across 9 transactions at an average of $27.6M, below the five-year Q1 average of $54.89M. Growth-stage investment totaled $1.0M from one transaction, against a five-year Q1 average of $140.2M.

“Q1 2026 shows a specific configuration: capital concentrated at earlier stages, growth-stage activity near zero, exit conditions unchanged, a pattern has persisted across several quarters,” said David Kornacki, Director, Data & Product, CVCA. “One quarter does not confirm a structural shift, but the data is consistent enough that the absence of domestic growth capital warrants attention. That is the stage where foreign participation increases, domestic ownership dilutes, and acquisition becomes more likely than IPO.”

According to KPMG Venture Pulse Q1 2026, global VC investment outside the United States totaled approximately $60.4B in Q1 2026, with Europe at $25.7B, Asia at $31.8B, and the rest of the Americas at $2.9B. The US figure of $267.2B was concentrated in a small number of AI infrastructure transactions: OpenAI ($122B), Anthropic ($30.6B), xAI ($20B), and Waymo ($16B), four deals representing approximately 57% of total global venture capital deployed in the quarter. In Europe, deal volume fell 40% year over year, with seed-stage deals down 44% and early-stage deals down 30%; late-stage deal volume held broadly in line with the prior four quarters. In Asia, deal counts held flat while capital concentrated into larger rounds.

Information and communications technology (ICT) led all sectors with 53 transactions at $365.3M, consistent with its share of deal count in recent quarters. Life sciences recorded 20 transactions at $158M. Cleantech recorded 12 transactions at $208.2M, driven by Mangrove Lithium Inc./Mangrove Water Technologies Ltd. ($118M) and Jetson ($69M); absent those two transactions, Cleantech capital was $21.2M across 10 transactions. Agribusiness recorded 6 transactions at $16.0M.

Ontario led deal count with 41 transactions (39.4%) at $145.1M (15.5% of capital). British Columbia led on capital with 21 transactions (20.2%) at $356.8M (38.1%), with the two Cleantech transactions accounting for $187M of British Columbia’s total. Quebec recorded 22 transactions (21.2%) at $292.4M (31.2%) and Alberta 13 transactions (12.5%) at $97.3M (10.4%).

Venture debt recorded 7 transactions at $248.4M. Deal count was the lowest recorded in a first quarter since CVCA began tracking venture debt in 2017, below the Q1 2025 figure of 17 transactions at $334.7M. Average facility size of $35.5M was the highest Q1 figure on record. Larger average facility sizes against lower deal count are consistent with companies accessing debt to extend runway in a quarter where equity availability at later stages was constrained.

Nine M&A exits closed with $571.9M in disclosed value, above the $231M recorded across 10 exits in Q1 2025. No initial public offerings occurred. Exit conditions remained constrained by prolonged acquisition timelines and broader macroeconomic uncertainty, consistent with 2024 and full-year 2025.

CVCA’s Q1 2026 Venture Capital Market Overview is now available as a web-based interactive report. The report is designed to be explored. Clicking through each data point surfaces the underlying transaction and regional detail behind the figures in this release. CVCA will continue to update the report’s methodology, metrics, and presentation as the private capital landscape evolves, and will introduce new features to the web-based format over time.

Q1 2026 at a glance:

In Q1 2026, CAD $3.86B was invested across 138 private equity transactions, compared to 124 transactions at $4.37B in Q4 2025 and $4.1B across 153 deals in Q1 2024. Eighty-five percent of disclosed transactions were valued below CAD $25M.

Two sectors, Metals and Mining and Oil and Gas, Power, together accounted for $2.08B or 54.5% of total capital deployed across 6 transactions. One disclosed transaction exceeded $500M and one undisclosed transaction exceeded $1B. The remaining $1.78B was distributed across 132 transactions.

“Ninety-five of 112 disclosed transactions in Q1 2026 were valued below $25M, consistent with the mid-market pace of recent quarters,” said David Kornacki, Director, Data & Product, CVCA. “Two transactions in critical minerals production, Nemaska Lithium and Champion Iron, together with Oil and Gas activity, accounted for the majority of the quarter’s reported capital. Q1 2026 Mining and Resources capital of $815M across two transactions exceeds the full-year 2024 and 2025 totals for that sector in the CVCA dataset.”

Mining and Resources recorded 2 transactions at $815M, driven by Nemaska Lithium Inc. ($678.8M, investors: Investissement Québec and Rio Tinto, closed February 10) and Champion Iron Limited ($136.5M, investor: Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec, closed February 7). Oil and Gas, Power recorded 4 transactions at $1,307.5M; specific deal terms were not disclosed. Information and communications technology (ICT) led all sectors by deal count with 41 transactions at $587.2M. Other sectors, including industrial and manufacturing, life sciences, and agri-forestry, continued to record activity across the mid-market.

According to KPMG Pulse of Private Equity Q1 2026 and EY’s Q1 2026 Private Equity Pulse, energy and natural resources, clean and climate technology, and infrastructure trended ahead of 2025 activity levels globally as investors directed capital toward asset-heavy sectors. Canada’s Q1 2026 concentration in Metals and Mining and Oil and Gas is directionally consistent with that global sectoral pattern.

Québec accounted for 90 transactions and $3,587.7M (93.0% of capital deployed). The dollar concentration reflects the named transactions above plus one undisclosed transaction exceeding $1B, all Québec-based. Ontario recorded 15 transactions at $52.0M. British Columbia recorded 17 transactions at $135.3M. Alberta recorded 10 transactions at $71.2M. Remaining provinces accounted for 16 transactions.

Eleven M&A exits closed with $559.6M in disclosed value, compared to 13 exits at $130M in Q1 2025. No initial public offerings occurred, and no secondary buyouts were recorded.

CVCA’s Q1 2026 Private Equity Market Overview is now available as a web-based interactive report. The report is designed to be explored. Clicking through each data point surfaces the underlying transaction and regional detail behind the figures in this release. CVCA will continue to update the report’s methodology, metrics, and presentation as the private capital landscape evolves, and will introduce new features to the web-based format over time.