Newfoundland and Labrador startup hub Genesis is renaming the “microfund” it uses to back early-stage startups in honour of a US$1 million donation it received as part of Nasdaq’s purchase of cybersecurity unicorn Verafin.

Now called the Nasdaq Genesis Microfund and freshly replenished with money from the donation, the fund offers startups in Genesis’s flagship Enterprise incubator program an additional $25,000 each of funding on top of what they already receive through the program.

“Nasdaq’s historic donation is having an immediate ripple effect in our start-up ecosystem,” said Genesis CEO Michelle Simms in a statement. “The founders of Verafin wanted this donation to directly benefit Newfoundland & Labrador start-ups with crucial early stage capital, and the Nasdaq Genesis Microfund allows us to do just that.

“It’s amazing to see companies like Verafin come full circle and be in a position to seed the next generation of this province’s business leaders.”

Verafin provides more than 2,000 financial institutions in North America with a cloud-based platform to help detect, investigate and report money laundering and financial fraud. The company became the most valuable startup in Atlantic Canadian history when it exited to Nasdaq in 2021 for US$2.75 billion.

Co-founders Jamie King, Brendan Brothers and Raymond Pretty, all of whom were graduate students at Memorial University when they launched Verafin in 2003, relied heavily on Genesis’s services in their company’s early days.

“Nasdaq’s investment in Genesis will accelerate growth in Newfoundland and Labrador’s technology sector, fostering prosperity throughout our province,” said King last year. “Genesis started us on the path that led Verafin to become a Nasdaq company and the global leader in anti-financial crime solutions.

“By supporting other technology entrepreneurs as they start their journey, Nasdaq and Verafin are committed to continuing to strengthen the local innovation ecosystem and create new opportunities within our community.”

In addition to topping up the microfund, Genesis will also use some of the money from Nasdaq to deliver a financial and investor readiness training program for founders, launch a “startup resource hub” compiling useful information for new entrepreneurs and promote Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in Newfoundland’s technology sector.