VC firm looks to bolster the industry knowledge it brings to startups
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Google Canada’s former engineering lead is joining Montreal-based venture capital firm Inovia Capital.
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Steven Woods joins as partner and Inovia’s first chief technology officer as one of Canada’s largest VC firms looks to bolster the industry knowledge it brings to startups as an investor.
“We try to assemble a team who’s been through it in different ways before,” Inovia partner Dennis Kavelman said in an interview. The VC, which manages more than US$1.5 billion, has backed some of the country’s most well-known tech companies, including Lightspeed, AlayaCare, Sonder, Hopper, Clearco, Snapcommerce and Symend.
“Steven has been a key part of the Waterloo tech ecosystem and he’s advised companies, mentored the folks in his organization, and seen all the challenges of growing from small to huge.”
Woods joined Google in 2008 and grew the Canadian engineering team to 1,300 employees from 20. Before joining Google, Woods built several software services and infrastructure companies.
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The move comes less than four months after Inovia raised secured US$450 million for its second growth equity fund, backed by the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec, Investissement Québec, Alberta Enterprise Corp., Kensington Capital Partners, Northleaf Capital, Fonds de solidarité FTQ and BMO Capital Markets.
This is not the first time Inovia is bringing on former executives from large technology companies. The firm hired ex-Google chief financial officer Patrick Pichette and former BlackBerry CFO Kavelman in 2018, both of whom are Canadian.
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