MONTREAL, October 29, 2026: Bloomsco has secured C$1 million in pre-seed funding from BDC Capital and Telegraph Ventures to deliver on-demand military training with AI, giving personnel tailored training when they need it.
Co-founder and CEO Hugh McGuire spent 15 years in education technology as founder and CEO of the open publishing platform Pressbooks. Co-founder and CTO Hadrien David was one of the founding engineers at Dialogue, helping build the company from inception to its IPO.
New threats and changing battlespace conditions are reshaping how armed forces operate. Traditional training models struggle to keep pace. Retired Vice-Admiral Ron Lloyd, former Commander of the Royal Canadian Navy and an adviser to Bloomsco, highlighted the urgency facing modern forces:
“Operations are changing in the battlespace faster than at any time in history. Success will be a direct reflection of how quickly those changes get into the training system.”
Bloomsco’s AI-native software transforms complex military knowledge into the foundation for on-demand training. It reads doctrine, technical manuals and data, organizes each role’s tasks, knowledge and skills, and designs training plans, learning materials, and simulation scenarios, based on learning science. Every output is traceable to its sources, with military experts shaping, reviewing and approving the content before deployment. When a sonar system is replaced, updated training gets to trainees immediately. When counter-drone tactics shift, new recruits would already be learning them.
“Training is the real engine of high-performing organizations, and in a world changing at breakneck speed, it has to keep pace,” said Hugh McGuire, CEO of Bloomsco. “We’re building Bloomsco so training is ready as missions, equipment and tactics change.”
An initial contract with the Department of National Defence (DND) put the approach into practice, producing a qualification standard and training plan for an officer role. That work led to an ongoing contract with the Canadian Defence Academy (CDA).
“Bloomsco is tackling a critical bottleneck in defence: keeping military training current as technologies, missions and operational requirements rapidly evolve,” said Dinar Ahmed, Partner at BDC’s Seed Venture Fund. “Its early traction with Canadian defence organizations demonstrates the need for a faster, AI-native approach to training development. Backing innovative Canadian companies like Bloomsco as they scale globally is core to our purpose as Canada’s development bank.”
Étienne Mérineau, General Partner at Telegraph Ventures, which co-led the round, said:
“What impressed us most about Bloomsco is their ability to navigate the complexities of the defence sector, understand the needs of military personnel on the ground, and translate those insights into cutting-edge AI technology.
“AI is at the heart of the transformation of military operations and training, and we believe Bloomsco has the talent, judgment, and execution capabilities to help Canada and its allies modernize and rise to the geopolitical and technological challenges of tomorrow.”
Building for Canada and its allies
Bloomsco plans to expand to NATO and allied countries, partnering with militaries and global defence primes that provide training alongside equipment. The investment will grow the engineering team and fund the development of tools that pinpoint which training needs updating when manuals or doctrine change. It will also strengthen support for deployment in classified and air-gapped environments.
The longer-term ambition is to build a global company that makes military training available on demand, for any role, wherever personnel serve. It aims to help forces prepare faster and operate more safely through responsible use of AI: military experts stay in control of training decisions, and content remains traceable to its sources.
About Bloomsco
Bloomsco is a Montreal-based defence technology company led by co-founders Hugh McGuire and Hadrien David. It turns information into effective military training. The company is advised by retired Vice-Admiral Ron Lloyd, former Commander of the Royal Canadian Navy and former Chief Data Officer at the Department of National Defence.
To learn more, visit bloomsco.ca and follow Bloomsco on LinkedIn.
Noah Note: Congrats to Bloomsco. I have heard good things about the company, amd hope to hear more from them in the future!