North America

In an increasingly competitive market, venture firms can improve their odds of survival by teaming up with larger PE firms with whom they have synergy. This week Sofinnova Partners, a Paris-based early-stage life sciences investor, sold a minority stake to Apollo in return for Apollo committing to invest up to €1 billion to its funds.

As is usually the case, increased rules mean higher compliance costs for those advisers who fall under regulation. For the biggest firms in the industry, those costs can be handled, but for smaller shops, and especially emerging managers, those costs could prove harmful.

New York and Halifax, Nova Scotia-based education technology startup Pressto has collected $1.5 million in pre-seed financing.

Toronto-based ChargeLab, a builder of software to operate and optimize electric vehicle charging equipment, has secured $15 million in Series A financing.

Canadian venture capital firm Round13 Capital has raised $70 million for a new fund focused on the emerging blockchain and digital asset market.

Mangrove Lithium, a technology platform for producing battery-grade lithium hydroxide, has raised additional financing, bringing the total to $25 million.

Dartmouth, Nova Scotia-based Mara Renewables Corp, a provider of sustainable plant-based nutritional and nutraceutical ingredients, has raised C$39.5 million in financing.

Fable Tech Labs, a Toronto-based startup that helps make digital products more usable by people with accessibility challenges, has raised $10.5 million in financing, the Globe and Mail reported.

Canada's venture capital market saw C$4.5 billion invested across 196 financings in Q1 2022, the second-highest quarterly deployment on record.