Montréal-based construction technology startup Brdg has raised $850,000 CAD in pre-seed funding to expand its artificial intelligence-powered platform for managing construction financing. The round, completed through a simple agreement for future equity, included Forum Ventures and undisclosed strategic investors from the real estate and construction finance sectors. Brdg plans to use the capital to grow its team, strengthen its technology, and expand across Canada.
Addressing Construction Finance Inefficiencies
Construction financing often depends on phased loan disbursements known as construction draws, which allow lenders to release capital as developers reach specific project milestones. The process typically requires extensive coordination among developers, lenders, and cost consultants, while relying heavily on spreadsheets, documents, emails, and manual administrative work. Brdg was created to centralize these activities and reduce the time required to prepare, review, and process draw requests.
Co-founders Ness Cabessa and Samuel Brand encountered these challenges through their respective backgrounds in general contracting and real estate development. Their experience highlighted how particularly difficult construction financing can become for larger projects and for smaller developers that lack extensive internal financial and administrative infrastructure. After identifying limited technological solutions addressing the issue, they launched Brdg in 2024 alongside co-founder Daniel Bensoussan.
Building a Centralized Platform
Brdg has developed a construction finance platform that replaces fragmented workflows with software designed to manage key elements of the financing process in one system. The platform automates tasks including document collection, compliance reviews, budget validation, and the preparation of construction draw packages. By reducing administrative work, the company aims to improve collaboration between developers, cost consultants, and lenders throughout a project's financing lifecycle.
The startup is also applying artificial intelligence to workflows that traditionally require significant manual review and data handling. Its technology is intended to help developers organize financing requirements while enabling cost consultants to automate repetitive administrative responsibilities associated with overseeing construction draws. Brdg ultimately aims to build a broader operating infrastructure capable of supporting multiple participants across the construction finance ecosystem.
Backing From Forum Ventures
Forum Ventures participated in the pre-seed round alongside strategic investors with experience in real estate and construction finance. Forum partner Kevin Corliss highlighted the founders' industry experience and their distribution strategy, which involves working with cost consulting firms that already play an important role in construction financing. The investor sees Brdg's combination of sector expertise and commercial partnerships as an important foundation for building adoption in the market.
The financing also gives Brdg additional resources as it moves beyond its early product development stage. The company introduced its platform in beta around the beginning of 2026 before opening it to the broader market during the summer. Since then, Brdg has been working with industry participants involved in projects representing more than $600 million in active development.
Expanding Across Canada
Projects supported through Brdg's industry relationships span several categories of commercial and residential construction. These include high-rise rental developments, industrial properties, hotels, and shopping centers, giving the startup exposure to different financing requirements and project structures. The company intends to use this growing activity to refine its platform and establish additional relationships within Canada's construction lending industry.
Part of the new funding will support expansion of Brdg's five-person team and further development of its artificial intelligence capabilities. The startup plans to introduce more agentic AI functionality that can perform increasingly complex tasks within construction financing workflows while continuing to pursue partnerships with lenders and other industry participants. Its longer-term ambition is to establish Brdg as a central technology platform connecting the various parties involved in financing construction projects.
Brdg's $850,000 CAD pre-seed round reflects growing efforts to digitize financial and administrative processes within the construction industry. By combining centralized workflow software with artificial intelligence, the Montréal startup is targeting a financing process that remains heavily dependent on manual coordination and fragmented systems. With backing from Forum Ventures and strategic industry investors, Brdg is now focused on expanding its platform, team, and presence across the Canadian construction finance market.
Source: betakit