Georgian has led a $21M CAD/$15M USD Seed round for Dominion Dynamics, with participation from Bessemer Venture Partners and British Columbia Investment Management Corporation (BCI).
Founded in 2025 by CEO Eliot Pence, Dominion Dynamics is a defence technology company building the "Arctic autonomy stack"—a fusion of sensing, autonomy and networked platforms designed for the world’s harshest and most strategically exposed environments.
The Market Opportunity: The Emergence of ‘Neoprimes’
For the past several years, Georgian has been tracking the growth of the defense startup ecosystem. Georgian identified 3 market tailwinds that helped support our conviction in this space:
- Georgian has been following the growth of a defense startup ecosystem and emerging “neoprimes” (i.e. companies like Anduril and Helsing that appear to be solving problems faster and more cost-effectively than legacy defense contractors). As technology investors, we believe that defense is becoming a broad source of tech innovation across diverse disciplines like physical AI, cybersecurity, edge computing and others.
- Geopolitical uncertainty is prompting an increase in defense spending. In Canada, for instance, defense spending is expected to rise from 1.3% of GDP in 2024 to 2% in 2026, with a long-term commitment by the Canadian government to increase defence spending from 2% of GDP to 5% over the next decade.
- Arctic security now appears to require investment and modernized infrastructure, strengthening deterrence against geopolitical uncertainty. Dominion Dynamics is building a modern data network for the Arctic, designed to connect sensors, autonomy and other networked platforms. Dominion’s goal is to help solve the lack of visibility governments have in the Arctic, NATO’s most strategically exposed operating environment, and to establish a software foundation for operations with dual-use (i.e. military and civilian/commercial) capabilities.
Why Dominion Dynamics?
Given the market opportunity, two things stood out to us when deciding to invest in Dominion Dynamics:
- Dominion’s product strategy is built around actively prototyping and testing technologies. Dominion has identified visibility gaps in the Arctic as well as gaps in government procurement processes. As an early example, Dominion entered a 3-year partnership with the Arctic Training Center to allow Dominion to test and validate its technologies in Arctic environments. Dominion has been actively prototyping hardware with off-the-shelf parts and developing integrated software systems for information gathering and coordinated operations in rugged Arctic environments.
- A visionary founder and team. From our first meeting, Eliot struck us as the type of founder who can execute an optimistic view while remaining deeply pragmatic. A former Anduril executive and Canadian Armed Forces veteran, Eliot brings a playbook that echoes past experience. The early team at Dominion Dynamics matches Eliot’s ethos. We also found it particularly notable to see that such an early startup was attracting promising technical talent from the US.
Looking Ahead
Our investment in Dominion Dynamics is a "Pathfinder" deal for Georgian, a designation we use for early checks into emerging technologies or markets. Pathfinder deals are intended to give us a ringside seat to learn about a company and emerging industry. Past Georgian Pathfinder deals include Xanadu and Tenstorrent.
With its talent, product strategy, and market timing, we believe Dominion Dynamics is uniquely positioned to help lead the defensetech ecosystem for Canada and its allies and are excited to partner in this journey.