Narwhal List Adds 16 High Velocity Canadian Companies

One of the most uniquely named tech lists to watch out for in Canada is back again with a new installment.

The Narwhal list has now been updated after a record-setting Q1 for 2018 in the Canadian technology sector. The list details some of the country’s fastest-growing and scaling private tech companies—a phenomenon the Narwhal list calls financial velocity. That term refers to the amount of funding a firm has raised (in millions of dollars) divided by the number of years it has been in existence.

The 2018 list was released in January but has now been updated to reflect some major investments. The new update focuses on both tech and healthcare companies, though the majority of updated companies land on the technology side of things.

Hootsuite tops this updated list, which is no surprise given that they were the highest-ranked tech company in the original 2018 list. There is no change in the order of the next five companies on the list either: coming in at second is Lightspeed POS; third is Thalmic Labs; fourth is Wealthsimple: and fifth is Kik Interactive. Check the top 15 below, or head to the site for the full top 50.

Narwhal List

The most interesting thing to take away from the updated list are the new entries, of which there are 16 in total. The highest-ranked new entry is CryptoKitties, the cryptocurrency-based game that was created by Vancouver’s Axiom Zen before raising $12 million to split off on its own and partner with the likes of Steph Curry. It enters the Narwhal technology list at number six with a financial velocity of 12.

In total there are 16 new companies on the narwhal list: 13 for the tech list and three for the healthcare list. The next-highest new companies on the tech side of things behind CryptoKitties are Platterz at thirteenth with a financial velocity of 10 and Drop at fifteenth with a velocity of 9.1.

Other new tech entries to the list include some fo the big names that have dominated headlines over the past half-year, such as Rubikloud, Coinsquare, Dialogue, IGLOO Software, and Uberflip.

Oh, and if you were wondering, the term “narwhal” is a play off unicorn, a designation coined by VC Aileen Lee given to startups that have crossed the billion dollar valuation mark. The annual list, along with these new updates updates—is put together by The Impact Centre.