Three months before the year-end figures are in we can all but confirm that Atlantic Canada is enjoying a record-setting year for venture capital investment.

Canada’s Venture Capital and Private Equity Association (CVCA) and Thomson Reuters last week released their VC stats for Canada and the good news is that the country is doing reasonably well this year in VC investment. The better news is that Atlantic Canada is doing brilliantly.

In the first three quarters of this year, venture capital firms have pumped $66.2 million into Atlantic Canadian companies; more than triple the $21.3 million the region received in ALL of 2010. There are a few more financings in the works, so I’m certain that the region will book more VC investment this year than the record $68 million of 2009.

Admittedly, the 2011 financings have been dominated by a couple of major plays in Nova Scotia, but that is not the whole story.

Almost half the financing to date comes from Dartmouth-based Unique Solutions’ $30 million financing from Northwater Capital's Intellectual Property Fund of Toronto. Unique, which installs scanning booths in malls to help consumers find clothes that are a perfect fit, is using the money to open more outlets in the U.S.

The other big investment this year was the $8 million investment in LED Roadway Lighting of Halifax by Nova Scotia Business Inc. and Cycle Capital of Montreal. (LED Roadway founder and CEO Chuck Cartmill also invested in the round, but my understanding is that is not included in the VC stats.)The company, which makes installations for energy-efficient outdoor lights, is using the money to expand internationally, and is having considerable success in Brazil.

But the follow-on rounds of these two companies don’t completely explain the impressive stats. When Atlantic Canada set a record two years ago in financing, 17 companies received investment. Already in the first three quarters of 2011, 12 companies were funded. So we’re on track for about 16 companies to receive funding – in the same ballpark as the record year of 2009.

Nova Scotia has tallied $46.2 million from January to September, up more than four-fold from $10.4 million in all of last year. (Last year was, admittedly, a pretty sorry performance in Nova Scotia.)

New Brunswick is also doing well, assuming that its investments are bona fide VC fundings.  New Brunswick companies have so far raised $18.6 million this year, driven largely by two investments in the second quarter worth a total of $15.9 million. I’ve asked and no one in the province can tell me which two companies received these investments. One source guessed that they could be mining financing, which purists say is not really a VC investment as it is not commercializing new technology.

Newfoundland and Labrador, which received no VC investment last year, has landed $1.4 million in three investments this year. Prince Edward Island has not attracted any VC financing since 2005.

The country overall is experiencing a pickup in VC investment, though CVCA President Gregory Smith warned that Canadian companies still receive about 40 percent less investment than their U.S. competitors. VC investment in Canada in the first nine months totaled $1.15 billion, slightly edging out the $1.13 billion raised last year.

One final note of regional pride: Atlantic Canada accounted for almost 6 percent of the VC investments in Canada so far this year, an uncommonly strong number. Last year, the figure was less than 2 percent.