The investment company Cycle Capital and H2O Innovation will launch this Wednesday the first Quebec venture capital fund intended for innovative technologies linked to water. The Cycle H2O fund – which will have a prize pool of 30 million – aims to support young startups in the sector, both in Quebec and in the east of the country.
“Climate change, as we know, is linked to greenhouse gas emissions. But the consequences of climate change are more and more often linked to water,” says Simon Olivier, partner at Cycle Capital who heads the new fund.
“Think about droughts and floods. This is why we must invest in solutions that will allow us to mitigate changes and impacts. » The limited quantity of water on Earth has already been “overused”, he recalls: “We must find alternative sources. This can come, for example, from water desalination, but also and above all from reuse. »
However, this requires the development of major technologies from different sectors, ranging from sustainable agriculture to green chemistry or digital water treatment technologies.
The sums from the Cycle H2O Fund currently come from Investissement Québec – the financial arm of the Quebec government – but also from the firm specializing in social investment Broan and the Climate Fund of Greater Montreal.
Please note: unlike the Toronto investment firm XPV Water Partners, the Cycle H2O fund will not invest in mature companies. The funds will be used to develop start-up technologies in the start-up phase.
The management of the fund will be ensured by both the firm Cycle Capital and H2O Innovation. With this new fund, “we are expanding our scope to water,” says founder and managing partner at Cycle Capital, Andrée-Lise Méthot. Water issues, she says, are among the “most pressing” environmental challenges.
For H2O Innovation, this is a first involvement in fund management like this. The Quebec company has become known over the years for the development of water treatment systems as well as the offering of services to maintain equipment related to the sector.
Highlighting the lack of investors in the water sector when he co-founded H2O Innovation in 2000, the company’s CEO, Frédéric Dugré, says he wants to support new “water entrepreneurs”, particularly those in phase starting.
