Three Atlantic Canadian startups walked away with $325,000 – more than one-third of the prize money on offer – at Startupfest in Montreal last week.

AgroGene Solutions of Moncton, Finleaf Technologies of Brooklyn, NS, and 3dBioFibR of Halifax all captured six-figure prizes at the annual tech and entrepreneurship festival. The three-day event, which attracts startups from across Canada and beyond, handed out $825,000 in prize money in its Winners’ Circle this year.

“With more prizes than ever and multiple categories increasing in value since last year, we saw hundreds of scaling startups hustling in the Startupfest Village over the past three days,” the organizers said in a statement. “We take great pride in our Winners’ Circle, a group of world-class founders, and we're thrilled to announce the winners of our 2026 investment prizes and grants.”

AgroGene Solutions received the $100,000 Best of the Fest Investment Prize, the headline prize at the competition.

Led by Co-Founder and CEO Pascale Michaud, AgroGene is developing advanced genetic solutions to improve crop productivity and sustainability through comprehensive honeybee hive diagnostics. Michaud, a molecular biologist, was also named “Emerging Innovator” at last year’s InnovateNB awards.

Finleaf Technologies won a total of $125,000 as it took the $100,000 Canadian Impact Investment 2026 Prize, as well as a $25,000 Startup in Residence grant.

Led by Danielle Maitland, Myrna Gillis, and Mike O’Keefe, Finleaf has developed circular economy technologies for converting aquaculture waste into phosphorus-rich fertilizers for agriculture.

3dBioFibR won the $100,000 Dual-Use and Sovereign Tech Investment Prize. The company was founded in 2020 by CEO Kevin Sullivan and Chief Scientific Officer John Frampton, a biomedical engineering professor from Dalhousie University. The company has developed a process to produce industrial quantities of collagen fibres, which are the tough, flexible protein fibres that make up connective tissues throughout the body.

Last year, 3dBioFibR closed a $3 million funding round.

You can find a complete list of winners from the Startupfest Winners’ Circle here.