Programs

Connecting the dots of innovation

Scale Up Canada’s mission is to establish and enhance Canada as a source of world class innovation, and help accelerate success for high potential Canadian startups.

We are a not-for-profit connecting Canadian innovators, industry experts, and strategic investors for global commercialization of Canada-made innovation, investor readiness of high-potential Canadian startups, and capacity building of community organizations working on the ground with Canadian founders.

Scale Up Canada offers the following programming streams to help bridge the success gap for Canadian founders and startups:

 1. Canada250

  • Most scalable Canadian startups list featuring regions of Toronto, Vancouver, Calgary, Montreal, Edmonton and Waterloo

  • Overarching goal is to establish and enhance Canada as a source of world class innovation,and raise $100 million in capital for each region’s startups

  • Aimed to help accelerate success for high potential Canadian startups by providing them access and intros to investors and strategic customers at a global scale

  • Opportunity to gain traction, global networks, strategic connections, and international visibility

  • Stage and sector agnostic

  • Open competition - open to all startups and scaleups in each region

  • No cost

Toronto50 - Applications open Jan 2027. Join first access wait list
Vancouver50 -Applications open Jan 2027. Join first access wait list
Calgary50 - Applications open Jan 2027. Join first access wait list
Montreal50 - Applications open Jan 2027. Join first access wait list
Edmonton50 - Applications open Jan 2027. Join first access wait list
Waterloo50 - Applications open Jan 2027. Join first access wait list

The jury for Canada250 2026 included Fortune 500 and FTSE 100 corporate VCs, venture funds from San Francisco, Paris, Berlin, Amsterdam, Qatar, Singapore, and Seoul; angel investors from US, Europe and Asia including recently retired Fortune 500 C-suite executives; and several celebrated Canadian founders with multiple unicorns between them.

2. EA+G

  • Expert Advisory + Grants

  • Overarching goal is to support high potential Canadian startups further the international commercialization of their technology, and become globally fundable

  • Hands-on support from Canadian, US and global experts towards growth, increased traction, geographic expansion outside of Canada, new sales, new distribution/strategic partnerships, fundraising support etc.

  • Access to cutting-edge knowledge and global networks in large industry sectors, subject matter experts in specialties such as cleantech, agtech, and healthtech, global cohort of seasoned tech executives and successfully exited founders, domain specialists with expertise in operating and growing tech startups in US, Canada, South-East Asia and the Middle-East, access to expertise of global investor networks including Fortune 500 and FTSE 100 corporate strategics, global conglomerates, sovereign funds, VC funds, family offices, and private equity

  • Customized for each startup and team with personalized mentorship, stage-specific acceleration - from MVP refinement to fundraising strategy, and a structured path to growth, investment, and market expansion

  • Government support may be available in some regions to cover costs

  • Financial support by Scale Up Canada (up to $50K grant)

  • In-kind contribution of $2 million+ per startup by Scale Up Canada

  • Scale Up Canada support non-dilutive and non-repayable

  • By invitation only

3. SuperAccelerator

  • Trajectory altering propellant for hyper-scaling startups

  • Aimed at fast-growth potential startups who want to raise and grow at a higher speed and a bigger scale

  • Overarching goal is making potential Canadian tech successes even more successful and world-leading in their categories

  • Three specialty streams

    • Healthtech - biotech, medical devices, digital health, platforms, diagnostics

    • Climate - cleantech and agtech including hardware, platforms, infrastructure

    • Wildcard Category - for companies building the future in categories yet undefined

  • By invitation only

  • Program launch Fall 2026

4. Founder’s Playbook

  • Aimed at founders, builders and operators of startups

  • Knowledge sharing from experts on what it takes to build from 0 to 1, and then scale from 1 to 100

  • Featuring national and global experts in building, operating and funding of startups 

  • Experts include global VCs with multi-unicorn portfolios, Canadian, US and global founders with hundreds of millions raised, corporate VCs from Fortune 500 and FTSE 100 companies, super-angels from Silicon Valley, family offices from US, EU, the Middle-East, and South-East Asia, plus sovereign funds from around the globe

  • Includes in-person and online events, workshops, and speaker series

  • Program launch Fall 2026

5. AccessFoundry

  • Startup readiness engine for under-represented founders

  • Program launch early 2027