The Wall Street Journal is reporting that OMERS Ventures has raised a whopping $260 million CDN, or $199 million USD, from Cisco, Bank of Montreal, as well as parent OMERS.
The financing raises OMERS Ventures total funding to $470 CDN, about halfway to its stated goal of $1 billion in venture capital.
In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, OMERS Ventures’ CEO, John Ruffolo, noted that both new investors will provide ancillary benefits beyond funding. Cisco and the Bank of Montreal can expedite OMERS deal flow in emerging tech and FinTech, respectively.
“We were founded in 2011 with a strong belief that investments in the Canadian technology ecosystem can help OMERS to meet our pension obligations to our members,” Ruffolo said in a statement to BetaKit. “Fund II builds on the momentum of our Fund I, and the two together represent one of the largest long-term private capital pools active in Canada’s venture sector.”
While OMERS new fundraising is massive from a Canadian perspective, it is still relatively small when compared to U.S. counterparts. The Wall Street Journal noted that OMERS latest round would not rank among the top 10 U.S. funds to have closed financing this year.