SAAS NORTH AI and Dominion Dynamics Launch DEPLOY, a Dual-Use Defence-Tech Summit Built for Founders and Investors

OTTAWA--(BUSINESS WIRE)--SAAS NORTH AI, Canada’s conference for AI and software founders and operators, today announced DEPLOY, a one-day defence-technology summit for companies eyeing, entering, or expanding in the defence and dual-use market. Presented by Dominion Dynamics and co-sponsored by Anvil, DEPLOY takes place November 5, 2026 at Rogers Centre Ottawa.

“Canada’s defence build-out is real, and a lot of our best founders are quietly asking whether they belong in it. They haven’t had a straight answer, or a room of their own to find one." - David Tyldesley, Co-Founder, SAAS NORTH AI

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DEPLOY arrives amid the largest increase in Canadian military spending since the Second World War. In March, the federal government said it had reached NATO’s target of spending two percent of GDP on defence. Its first Defence Industrial Strategy, launched in February, commits $6.6 billion over five years to building domestic capability, including lifting the share of federal defence contracts awarded to Canadian firms from 43 percent today to 70 percent by 2035. The bet is national as much as commercial: the capabilities Canada is now trying to buy may already exist inside its early-stage and scaling software and AI companies, if those founders can be convinced the market is theirs to build and to keep at home.

A June 2026 report from BDC and The Icebreaker, based on a survey of 642 Canadian small and medium-sized businesses, found 374 firms actively looking to enter defence.

Ottawa hosts trade shows, procurement briefings and policy forums year-round. What the city has lacked is an event for startups and scaleups building in software, AI and autonomy areas, where Canada has distinct advantages. Part of what DEPLOY sets out to do is to normalize the idea that building for defence is a legitimate, even patriotic, path for a Canadian software founder.

DEPLOY’s starting point is a distinction its organizers call product-problem fit. In commercial software, the better product usually wins when it is faster, cheaper or more capable. Defence does not buy that way. It buys specific capabilities that solve problems it already recognizes, which means a technically excellent product can be irrelevant.

“Canada’s defence build-out is real, and a lot of our best founders are quietly asking whether they belong in it. They haven’t had a straight answer, or a room of their own to find one. That’s what DEPLOY is: founder to founder, honest about how hard this is, and useful whether you’re deciding to enter or already in and looking to go further.”

David Tyldesley, Co-Founder, SAAS NORTH AI

The program follows the three barriers in the order founders encounter them. Build asks whether defence is your market and whether your technology maps to a problem someone in uniform already has. Fund examines who is financing dual-use in Canada today and what those investors need to see. Sell addresses how the market actually buys and where a small company can realistically begin.

DEPLOY is built for founders at three distances from the market: those still deciding whether defence is for them, those who have just entered, and those already operating who want to expand. Because financing ranks among their steepest barriers, DEPLOY brings defence-literate investors together with founders and operators rather than confining them to a separate stage. Without capital that understands defence timelines, the earlier questions of problem fit and market access rarely matter.

"Canada's next generation of defence technology will be built by ambitious entrepreneurs. DEPLOY exists to help them scale globally while strengthening Canada's sovereign industrial capabilities. SAAS NORTH AI is the ideal place to launch that mission."

Eliot Pence, Founder and CEO, Dominion Dynamics

Dominion Dynamics builds Arctic surveillance systems for the Canadian Armed Forces. In June 2026, it closed a $139-million Series A led by Georgian, widely reported as the largest defence-technology Series A in Canadian history, bringing its total raised to $169 million.

“Canada's defence sector is in a genuine period of growth. Opportunities that bring our technology and investment community together make the whole ecosystem stronger, which means more talent, more jobs, and more capability that stays here instead of going elsewhere. We're proud to support DEPLOY.”

Sam Witherspoon, CEO & Co-Founder, Anvil

DEPLOY runs inside SAAS NORTH AI, which expects more than 2,000 founders, operators and investors across the two days. Tickets to DEPLOY include access to the wider SAAS NORTH AI program schedule, networking events and investor zone and are available now at saasnorth.com/deploy.

About SAAS NORTH AI

SAAS NORTH AI is Canada’s longest-running and largest in-person conference for software and AI founders and operators, held annually in Ottawa. Founded in 2016 as SAAS NORTH by Cube Business Media Inc. and Kanata-based L-SPARK, it is now in its 11th year and convenes more than 2,000 founders, operators and investors for two days of founder-to-founder learning, capital connections and community. saasnorth.com.

About Dominion Dynamics

Dominion Dynamics is an Ottawa-based defence technology company building the autonomy stack for Arctic and allied operations, strengthening Canadian sovereignty and NATO security in the High North. Founded in 2025, Dominion has deployed with the Canadian Armed Forces and raised the largest Series A in the history of Canadian defence. defendthedominion.com.

About Anvil

Anvil is an Ottawa-based defence and dual-use technology company whose AI platform unifies any data type into a single, enriched source of truth for national security teams. Building in Canadian defence for over a decade, it is now deployed with organizations supporting Canada and its allies, with testing across NATO nations and Ukraine. anvil.ai.