Cohere Announces Initial Close of Record Series E Targeting CAD $7B 

Toronto-based Cohere, a provider of sovereign AI for regulated industries and governments, has announced the initial close of a Series E round targeting up to CAD $7 billion at a CAD $35.7 billion valuation, the largest private financing ever by a Canadian technology company. The companies of Schwarz Group lead the round, joined by Bell Ventures, Bullhound Capital and the Government of Canada, with Inovia Capital, NVIDIA and Prosperity7 Ventures returning.

CEO and co-founder Aidan Gomez called the round historic for both Cohere and Canada. Since launching its agentic AI platform North, Cohere has grown ARR 165% year over year and expanded to 300 customers, including RBC, Fujitsu and TD Bank. CFO Francois Chadwick said the funds will advance its models, build verticalized AI for regulated sectors and expand compute infrastructure.

Christian Müller, CEO of Schwarz Digits, said the deal follows Cohere’s combination with Aleph Alpha and aims to anchor frontier AI in its sovereign STACKIT cloud. Prime Minister Mark Carney said sovereignty now depends on building and governing AI on Canada’s own terms, while AI Minister Evan Solomon said Canadian companies should not need to leave the country to succeed globally. German Digital Minister Karsten Wildberger highlighted growing German-Canadian cooperation on sovereign AI.