Building on the success of their first joint fund, Business Devleopment Bank of Canada (BDC) and the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec today announced the creation of a new $330 million fund dedicated to Canadian small- and medium-sized buinesses.

The fund will be managed by BDC, with capital provided by both institutions.

Investments in companies from all sectors will take the form of subordinate and equity financing. AlterInvest, the limited partnership created by the Caisse and BDC for this initiative, will benefit from BDC’s country-wide network of over 90 branches while the capital invested by both institutions will be leveraged to support more entrepreneurs with rapidly growing businesses.

Since 2003 and through the first AlterInvest fund, BDC and the Caisse have made average investments of $1 million in close to 300 Canadian companies, of which 35% are in Quebec.

“We want to continue the success of the first alliance between BDC and the Caisse, which has helped us to achieve our common objectives with entrepreneurs,” stated Jacques Simoneau, BDC’s executive vp, investments. “BDC Subordinate Financing is part of our range of investment and financing activities which enable us to be involved in all stages of the development of Canadian companies.”

“Both our institutions want to support companies with strong growth potential. We really wanted to repeat the experience of the first fund, which has made investments in about 100 Quebec companies over the past three years. With our complementary expertise, this partnership is once again giving effect to our commitment to SMEs,” said Normand Provost, the Caisse’s executive vp, private equity.