Cohere announced the initial close of a Series E on Thursday that targets up to C$7 billion at a C$35.7 billion valuation, a raise the Toronto company calls the largest private financing in Canadian history. In US dollars, the round is up to $5 billion at a $20.5 billion valuation, roughly triple Cohere's value a year earlier.
Schwarz Group is leading the round, with its companies having committed $600 million earlier. New investors are Bell Ventures, Bullhound Capital, and the Government of Canada. Returning backers include Inovia Capital, Nvidia, and Prosperity7 Ventures.
Canada's federal government agreed to invest up to $1.14 billion. Cohere says it will keep its headquarters in Canada and invest about $1.2 billion in computing infrastructure in the country by 2030. The release describes the government's equity stake as support for Canadian jobs and compute, and as a way to give Canadians a share in Cohere's success.
Key facts
- 01Cohere announced the initial close of a Series E targeting up to C$7 billion at a C$35.7 billion valuation on October 29.
- 02In US dollars the round is up to $5 billion at a $20.5 billion valuation, roughly triple Cohere's value a year earlier.
- 03Schwarz Group leads; the Government of Canada, Bell Ventures and Bullhound Capital are new investors alongside Nvidia.
- 04Canada's government agreed to invest up to $1.14 billion; Cohere plans about $1.2 billion of Canadian compute by 2030.
- 05Cohere says ARR grew 165% year over year in Q3 2026 and customers rose 20x to 300.
Prime Minister Mark Carney spoke at a press conference with Cohere on Thursday. In the company's release, he said true sovereignty depends on Canada's ability to build, adopt, and govern AI on its own terms.
“The most powerful AI systems are concentrated in a very small number of companies, in a very small number of countries”— Mark Carney, Prime Minister of Canada
Cohere did not say how much money is committed at the first close. Chief financial officer Francois Chadwick said the first close includes "most of it," and declined to give a revenue figure or comment on a possible stock listing.
Cohere said annual recurring revenue grew 165% year over year through the end of the third quarter, driven by its North agentic AI platform. Its customer count rose 20-fold in a year to 300, including Aston Martin Aramco, Bell Canada, Fujitsu, RBC, RWS, PwC, TD Bank, and TKMS. Those figures are the company's own.
The money will go to Cohere's model and product roadmap, industry-specific AI products for regulated sectors, long-term compute for training frontier-level enterprise models, and expansion across North America, EMEA, and APAC. Cohere also plans to hire for more than 1,000 positions.
“These investments are critical for the next chapter of our growth”— Aidan Gomez, Cohere co-founder and CEO
The raise lands alongside other expansion moves. Cohere is combining with Germany's Aleph Alpha, with headquarters in Berlin and Toronto, and is acquiring cybersecurity startup AISLE, which will become Cohere Cyber. Schwarz Digits aims to run Cohere's models on its STACKIT cloud.
Cohere's release cites a McKinsey projection of a $600 billion market for sovereign AI, the segment it is targeting with governments and regulated industries.
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