LOI Venture, the venture fund launched by Hootsuite founder Ryan Holmes and New Avenue Capital founder Manny Padda, has announced its first close. Holmes confirmed with BetaKit that over one-third of the $20 million target was reached.
The group of limited partners that contributed to its first round of financing include a laundry list of Canadian entrepreneurs and innovators.
That list includes Dapper Labs co-founders Roham and Sam Gharegozlou, Clearco founder Michele Romanow, Smartsweets founder Tara Bosch, Vega founder Charles Chang, Craft Ventures’ Bill Lee, Hollyburn’s Mark Sander, Trainerize founder Sharad Mohan, Pioneer Square Labs founder Geoff Entress, Bossa Properties’ Darryl Bosa, and Tiny’s Andrew Wilkinson.
“After 1 month of announcing Fund I for LOI Venture, I’m excited to share [that] we’ve reached our first close with a group of rockstar LPs,” wrote Holmes on LinkedIn. “They range from unicorn founders to former LOI – League of Innovators alumni.”
Launched in December, LOI Venture is a pre-seed fund focused on supporting founders aged 15 to 30 attending Holmes’ League of Innovators (LOI) program. The program was founded in 2017 as a charity to help accelerate the growth of young Canadian entrepreneurs.
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To date, LOI has graduated 250 businesses with a combined valuation of nearly $1 billion. It claims it has also engaged 12,000 youth.
LOI Venture has already allocated its first cheque, investing in WFHomie, a Toronto-based employee engagement software company, in a $1.5 million USD round.
In his LinkedIn post, Holmes also announced that four venture partners will be joining the fund, namely: Dario Meli, executive chairman of Quietly; Melissa Allen, executive director of League of Innovators; Future Capital’s Marlon Thompson; and Filament Health’s Tom Kineshanko.
League of Innovators alumni Swish Goswami (Trufan) and Daniel Dubois (Key Living) are also joining the fund as venture advisors.
Holmes and Padda sit on LOI’s board of directors along with Goswami; Chad Bayne, who is noted as a founding sponsor of Creative Destruction Labs; and Cheesan Chew, the COO of RBC Ventures.