News Summary

Québec’s Mila, a leading AI institute, is in the early stages of developing a venture capital fund aimed at turning its research output into commercial ventures. Jonathan Shaanan, former managing partner of Circle K Ventures, has joined Mila as a strategic advisor to spearhead this initiative. The fund aims to amplify the number of startups emerging from Mila’s talent pool and ensure many are established in Canada. Although still in exploration phases, strong interest has been expressed by strategic partners, including some American VCs. The initiative comes at a time when concerns about tech talent migrating to the US are intensifying. Mila’s efforts are part of a broader strategy to retain talent and boost startup creation in Canada. Founded in 1993 by Yoshua Bengio, Mila has grown into a joint initiative with academic institutions like Université de Montréal and McGill University, supported by the federal government’s Pan-Canadian AI Strategy.