"Brightspark is about the only seed/early stage private VC fund remaining in Toronto," Skapinker adds. "We have watched the Labour sponsored funds being decimated, other funds unable to raise monies or fleeing the market, the fund investor market shrink progressively over a number of years."
"The reality is that this is not just an Ontario or a Canadian issue. The VC industry is evolving and rationalizing itself on a global level. The only (relatively) healthy VC markets are Silicon Valley and Israel, each for their own reason. In Silicon Valley, you have an entire industry with an infrastructure, critical mass, momentum and a “working system”. With repeat entrepreneurs, startup culture, sophisticated investors and an industry round it, other areas have not been able to replicate this success. In Israel, you have the support of an economy and government along with great training, which is underpinned by entrepreneurs who understand that startups are the hugest growth area of its economy. This too cannot be repeated anywhere else."
"The US market has always been our curse and blessing in Canada – on the one hand, we have access to this huge marketplace; on the other hand we don’t have the underlying infrastructure to compete."
Avro Arrow