BDC Venture Capital

Dinar Ahmed is a Partner at BDC Capital's Seed Venture Fund, where he focuses on investments in software, AI, deeptech, physical AI, and defence/dual-use companies.

Geoff J. Catherwood is a Partner on the Industrial, Clean & Energy Venture Fund and Asset Management Team at BDC Venture Capital. A Professional Engineer with 14 years of experience in process control and industrial automation, he brings operational expertise across service, engineering, management, and sales. Catherwood serves on the boards of multiple early-stage companies and focuses on venture capital investments in cleantech and electronics hardware.

Jack Fraser is a Partner at BDC Capital's Growth Venture Fund who focuses on hyper-growth companies in FinTech, digital media, and e-commerce. He has held Strategic COO and CFO roles overseeing product management, marketing, technology, corporate development, finance, and operations, and previously founded Canada's first travel credit card. His background includes corporate banking experience and involvement in global value chain development across multiple growth stages.

Phil Anzarut is Vice President and Partner in Asset Management at BDC Capital. He has experience across corporate strategy, corporate finance, venture capital, marketing, human resources, and mergers and acquisitions. His board committee experience includes HR, audit, M&A, strategy, governance, and CEO search.

Shirley Speakman is Managing Partner of the Climate Tech Fund and Sustainability Venture Fund at BDC, a $1.2B platform investing in Canadian companies addressing climate and sustainability challenges. Previously, she was a senior partner at Cycle Capital and Director of Investments for the MaRS Investment Accelerator Fund, where she led investments and transactions across sectors including clean technology, life sciences, and advanced manufacturing. Speakman holds an MBA from Wilfrid Laurier University and a BA in Economics from the University of Waterloo, and serves as Chair of the Research Innovation and Commercialization Center.

Steven Abrams is a Partner at BDC Venture Capital, where he focuses on the IT Venture, Thrive, and Women in Tech Funds. He serves as a board director or observer for numerous portfolio companies including Hopper, Waabi, Sanctuary AI, and Sheertex, among others, and has invested in companies that have achieved exits including Coveo, Unsplash, and Sonder. Abrams is a charter member of the C100 and holds board positions with the Upside Foundation and Mount Sinai Hospital Foundation.

Arun Eapen is Director of Fund Investments at BDC Capital. His experience spans private markets investing, with a focus on infrastructure and cleantech.

Byron Thom is a partner at BDC's Industrial Innovation Venture Fund (I2VF), where he invests in and advises startups and technology companies on strategy, go-to-market, and governance. He previously served as Vice President, Corporate Development and Strategy at Cymax Group Technologies and as a Principal at Framework Venture Partners, where he was a board observer for Cymax following its Series B financing. He is Vice Chair of the Board of Governors at UBC and Chair of its Finance Committee, holds the ICD.D designation obtained in 2025, and is licensed to practice law in British Columbia.

Daniel Drouet is a Partner with the Black Entrepreneurs Fund at BDC and has worked in technology for over 25 years as an entrepreneur, venture capitalist, and mentor. He founded several companies, including the early-stage venture capital fund Real Ventures, and has experience in venture financing, product management, engineering, and M&A across North America, Africa, and the Middle East. He has mentored in multiple startup accelerators, led a training program for venture capitalists, and served for five years as an Adjunct Professor of Entrepreneurship.

François Crémet is Vice President, Strategy & Operations at BDC Capital. He previously worked as a business strategy and management consultant in Canada and Europe, developing experience across the corporate sector before joining an institutional investor. His work involves collaborating with investment professionals, portfolio companies, and partners to develop sustainable business strategies.

Laurie oversees Volta's finance and administration, bringing more than 25 years of financial, corporate, investor relations, and administrative experience with public and private mining and technology companies.

Mathieu Duffar is a Partner on the Growth Venture Fund at BDC Capital, a role he has held since January 2024, where he focuses on late-stage businesses in areas including artificial intelligence, machine learning, blockchain, and IoT across sectors such as eCommerce, AdTech, AgTech, and HealthTech. His investments include StackAdapt, Colab Software, KOHO, and Certn, and he serves as a Board Observer at Powerside. He also contributes to BDC's Dual Defense Team, which addresses solutions in mobility, defense, and robotics.

Matt Stanley is a Partner at BDC Capital's Climate Tech Fund with over 20 years of experience in sustainability and climate strategy across Canada and Europe. His career includes roles at IKEA, where he helped build the company's corporate venture arm, and advisory firms including SYSTEMIQ, Deloitte, and EY, focused on industrial decarbonization and capital deployment. He holds a Master's degree in Sustainability Leadership from the University of Cambridge and a Bachelor of Commerce from Mount Allison University.

A life sciences leader with over 20 years of experience building and scaling biotechnology and medical technology companies, appointed to lead the new fund with expertise in scientific models and commercialization.

Remi Fournier is a Partner at BDC focused on clean energy, climate technologies, and sustainability investments. With over 20 years of experience in venture capital and entrepreneurship, he cofounded Fibrenoire, a fiber optic network for businesses in Eastern Canada that was subsequently acquired by Videotron, where he served as VP of Sales and Engineering. His background spans telecommunications, digital advertising, software technologies, and product commercialization, complemented by technical expertise and farming operations.

Chief Operating Officer and Program Director who supports early-stage companies through VIATEC's programs including the Accelerator Program; has been a programmer, founder, angel investor, mentor and coach in local tech.

Duncan Stewart is a partner at the Business Development Bank of Canada's Deep Tech Venture Fund, which focuses on dual-use defence technologies and has $200 million in capital. He holds advanced degrees in applied physics from Stanford University and engineering physics from the University of Toronto, and has over 30 years of experience in science and technology for defence and national security. His background includes a decade leading a research centre at Canada's national laboratory with over 100 physicists and chemists working on quantum science and technology, and ten years at Hewlett-Packard Laboratories in Silicon Valley where he authored 60 patents and contributed to foundational research in nanoscale electronics and memristive materials.

Christopher Gillam is a Principal at BDC's Industrial Innovation Venture Fund. The Fund invests in technologies applied to core sectors of the Canadian economy, including agtech and foodtech, advanced manufacturing, and natural resources, with a focus on partnering with entrepreneurs to scale their businesses.

Connor Edwards is a Principal at BDC, focusing on early-stage venture investments in climate, software, and AI. His background includes management consulting and banking, along with an early role at Hootsuite. He also makes personal investments in capital-light, AI-native businesses, with interests spanning vertical AI, B2B software, fintech and embedded finance, digital health, and the future of work.

Nicole Leite is a Principal with the Climate Tech Fund at BDC Capital. Her background includes impact investing, investment banking, and renewable project financing. She holds an MBA from INSEAD.

Paras Sharma is a Principal at BDC, where he works with the Life Sciences Venture Fund. His prior experience includes roles at adMare, Eisai, Alexion, and the Abramson Cancer Center.

Salman Qadir is an investor with the Sustainability Venture Fund at BDC Capital, a $150 million fund investing in early-stage companies developing scalable technologies for net-zero economies. His investment focus includes industrial IoT, proprietary data applications, and AI-driven solutions addressing climate action, clean energy, and sustainable urban development.

Mona Minhas is a Kauffman Fellow, a member of Class 31 of the two-year venture capital leadership program run by Kauffman Fellows. The program's member directory lists them at BDC Thrive Venture Fund in Canada.

Alexa Goldhar is an investor with BDC Capital's Growth Venture Fund. She holds an MBA with a specialization in entrepreneurship and has over four years of experience in financial analysis and market research, with a background in health-tech spanning the supply chain and pharmaceutical sectors.

Andy directs Volta's AI Productivity Lab, helping Atlantic Canadian SMEs adopt practical AI tools through experimentation, training, and support, with expertise in process and organizational design and rapid prototyping.

Brian Chan is an Associate Principal with the Climate Tech Fund at BDC. He has more than eight years of experience investing in venture capital funds and making direct company investments, with work spanning financial analysis, deal structuring, industry research, and portfolio management. Chan holds the CFA designation.

Cassidy Emby is a Senior Analyst with the Thrive Venture Fund and the Women in Technology Fund at BDC. She previously worked as an Investment Banking Analyst at Scotiabank, covering the consumer, industrial, and retail sectors in Western Canada.

Cole Brodkin is an Analyst at BDC's Thrive Venture Fund, which invests in women-led startups across Canada. He holds an MBA from the Ivey Business School and has a background in early-stage venture capital.

Darian Hirst is an investor with the Indigenous Fund at BDC Capital. His background includes experience in UX, product, and strategy, spanning work with design and product management teams, portfolio company leadership, and investment thesis development. His stated professional interests include climate change and reaching net-zero emissions.

Erika Remigio is a Venture Capital Analyst at BDC, where she works with early-stage startups on pre-seed fundraising. She holds a graduate degree (MASc) in chemical engineering and previously completed an internship at 3M Canada, focusing on research and problem-solving related to materials synthesis. Her prior experience also includes project management.

Evan Greene is an investor with BDC Capital's $500M Growth Venture Fund, where he leads financial, market, and commercial underwriting for growth-stage technology investments, including companies such as Cohere, KOHO, Miovision, and ApplyBoard. His prior experience includes several years in transaction execution across a 30-company venture portfolio—covering restructurings, share conversions, secondary transactions, and exits—more than three years in commercial technology banking, and a go-to-market role at a venture-backed SaaS company; he has also served as a board observer for two venture-backed businesses. He is completing an Executive MBA at the University of Oxford.

Evan Machin is a Senior Commercial Account Manager at BDC with experience in investment, financial leadership, public-sector governance, and military service. His background combines analytical expertise with operational and team leadership experience.

Joshua Smith is an Associate Director on the Fund Investments team at BDC Capital, where he invests in venture capital funds across Canada. Previously, he served as an investment manager at Big Society Capital in London, deploying £15 million across four venture funds focused on health, financial inclusion, and education, and led the development of the venture team's co-investment program and several data initiatives. Earlier in his career, he worked as a management consultant with KPMG Australia and MaRS Discovery District for nearly five years.

Leana Keto is a Principal with BDC Capital's Industrial Innovation Venture Fund, drawing on an engineering background in the energy industry and experience with early-stage ventures. She previously served as Program Manager at SVG Ventures | THRIVE, an investment fund and accelerator for food and agriculture ventures, and as Energy Stream Manager at the Creative Destruction Lab, where she supported science-based start-ups in accessing mentorship and raising capital; her earlier engineering roles include positions at Schlumberger and Husky Energy. She holds a Bachelor of Applied Science in Civil Engineering and an MBA from the Sauder School of Business, both from the University of British Columbia.

Rainee Mistry is an investor at BDC Capital's Seed Venture Fund and IT Venture Fund, where she works with Canadian founders building technology companies at the pre-seed and seed stages across consumer, B2B software, hardware-enabled SaaS, and deep technology sectors. She has nearly five years of experience in venture capital and previously held operating roles at Super (formerly Snapcommerce), spanning product, new vertical expansion, M&A strategy, fundraising, and FP&A, as well as at CIBC's consumer products team. In addition to investing, she advises portfolio companies on growth strategy, distribution, product, fundraising, and financial planning.

Rakshith Nagaraj is a Senior Analyst with the Sustainability Venture Fund at BDC Capital, focusing on startup and deep tech investments. An aero-mechanical engineer by training, he previously designed structures for supersonic aircraft and special-purpose machines, working in product development, corporate strategy, and R&D across the manufacturing and automation sectors. He holds a graduate degree in Basic Mountaineering from the Himalayan Mountaineering Institute and has climbed more than 80 peaks worldwide, including Mt. Renok (5,200m) and Salkantay Pass (4,600m).

Sony Nguyen is an Associate in Venture Capital at BDC Capital, where she invests in early-stage, women-led companies. Her experience spans capital markets and the startup ecosystem, with investment focus areas including fintech, technology, media, digital healthcare, and life sciences. She is multilingual.

Vincent Fréchette-Coculuzzi is a Senior Analyst in fund investments at the Business Development Bank of Canada (BDC), where he works on venture capital and private equity fund investments. He holds a master's degree in finance.