Montreal – September 13, 2026 -- Onix, the Montreal-based startup behind what it calls Personal Intelligence, has closed $5 million USD (roughly $7 million CAD) in pre-seed funding led by Los Angeles-based Alpha Edison, with participation from Garage Capital, Ride Home Fund, and strategic backers Jeremy Zimmer, co-founder of UTA, and JS Cournoyer, co-founder of Real Ventures.
Round size dwarfs typical Canadian pre-seed deals
According to the Canadian Venture Capital and Private Equity Association, the raise is more than seven times the average Canadian pre-seed deal recorded in 2025 and exceeds the average Canadian seed round. U.S. investor participation in Canadian pre-seed deals fell from 23% in 2024 to 8% in 2025, making Alpha Edison's lead investment in a Canadian company a departure from that broader retreat.
Onix builds AI on licensed expert knowledge instead of scraped internet data
The company's platform trains AI systems exclusively on licensed knowledge from named experts who retain governance over how their intelligence is used. Nicholas Nadeau, Co-founder and CTO, said the industry's scale-first approach scraped public data but missed unpublished frameworks and case-based judgment that experts build over careers. Co-founder and CEO David Bennahum said the model preserves provenance and authorship so users know the source of guidance and experts keep ownership of their knowledge.
Capital will fund expert onboarding and public launch push
Proceeds will go toward platform development, expert onboarding, and research and evaluation as Onix moves toward broader public availability. The platform is currently in early access on iOS, with full commercial availability expected later this year and an Android version to follow.
Roster expansion adds seven health specialists across recovery, sleep and cardiology
New additions include Tim Westbrook (addiction recovery), Robin Berman, MD (psychiatry and parenting), Aric A. Prather, PhD (sleep psychology), Dr. Sanjay Bhojraj, MD (integrative cardiology), Nathalie Niddam (longevity and biohacking), Shivani Gupta, PhD (Ayurvedic inflammation care), and Ashley Shrader, DNP (family nurse practice). Onix launched with a founding cohort that included William Li, MD, Jordan Metzl, MD, and Dave Rabin, MD, PhD, among sixteen named experts spanning health and wellness categories.
Mila partnership and Top 100 ranking follow the funding announcement
Onix also disclosed a partnership with Mila, the Montreal AI research institute founded by Yoshua Bengio, and its inclusion among Canada's Top 100 AI Startups for 2026, a list compiled by ALL IN. Alpha Edison Managing Partner Nick Grouf said the fund invested because Onix built its approach around human expertise and privacy rather than aggregate internet data.