OMERS Ventures has appointed a new leader after a spate of executive changes at the early-stage fund.
The news: The Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System (OMERS) announced on Thursday that Laura Lenz will serve as the new head of OMERS Ventures, the pension fund’s venture investment arm. Lenz replaces Saar Pikar, who left the fund in July.
Lenz, who joined OMERS Ventures in 2019, led the fund’s Canadian investment activity and has had an extensive VC investing career, backing Canadian tech companies including Float, Hopper, and Solink.
From the source: “There has been a lot written about whether Canadians are ambitious enough. I pushed back on that argument when it surfaced a couple of years ago. I didn’t think our founders lacked ambition then, and I don’t think they do now,” Lenz wrote in a LinkedIn post. “The question is whether the ecosystem around them is prepared to match that ambition with patient capital, early customers, global networks, open markets, and institutions willing to use their scale to help Canadian companies succeed.”
The context: The appointment comes two months after former head Saar Pikar left to become president at Kensington Capital—the third executive change in as many years for OMERS Ventures, which is considered one of Canada’s top tech investors.
Last year, Pikar took over from Michael Yang as managing partner, head of ventures and growth. Yang had replaced Damien Steel, who left two years earlier to become CEO of carbon-capture tech company Deep Sky.
Final thought: Lenz’s promotion also follows a “strategic shift” at OMERS Ventures to focus more on Canadian investing. Amid Prime Minister Mark Carney’s push to stimulate domestic investment and renewed calls for pension funds to participate more in Canada, the new leadership direction at OMERS appears well-timed with buzz around Canadian investment.
Feature image courtesy OMERS Ventures.