BDC’s LIFT program offers preferential-rate financing and advisory to help Canadian SMEs adopt AI — how it works and who it suits.
dgm is an independent osFoundry integration partner — not affiliated with osFoundry’s maker (OS LLC), and dgm has no completed client integrations yet.
BDC LIFT is the Business Development Bank of Canada’s 2026 program to get Canadian SMEs adopting AI — and it is the route BDC itself now points former CDAP traffic toward.
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| What it is | BDC financing + advisory for AI adoption (launched 2026) |
| Type | Loans and paid advisory — not a grant |
| Software AI track | Financing up to $2M (per BDC) |
| Physical AI track | Financing up to $5M (per BDC) |
What LIFT offers
LIFT (Lead with Innovation and Focus on Technology) launched in 2026 with a $500M envelope to help Canadian SMEs adopt AI, pairing owners with BDC AI advisors and offering preferential-rate financing. BDC describes loans of up to $2M for software-focused AI projects and up to $5M for physical-AI projects, generally for businesses with annual sales above $1M, with preferential terms when technology is sourced from Canadian suppliers.
Loan, not grant
Important distinction: BDC is a Crown financial institution — LIFT provides financing and advisory, not free grant money. That can still be very useful for an AI project, but treat it as a loan with advisory attached, not a subsidy.
How to start
Apply through BDC. Important: these are programs a business applies for directly with the government agency, bank or cluster that runs them. dgm is an independent AI-integration agency — not a registered, approved or official deliverer of any program here. dgm can help assess fit and scope an AI project, but government money does not flow through dgm. LIFT advisors are BDC’s own. Program parameters, amounts and intake windows change frequently — confirm the current details on the official program page before relying on them.
Where dgm fits
dgm is an independent integration partner that helps Canadian businesses adopt osFoundry — scoping a first use case, handling the build, and connecting AI to the systems you already run. dgm can help you scope the AI project that a program would fund — but you apply to the program directly. dgm is independent of osFoundry’s maker (OS LLC) and has no completed client integrations yet, so everything described here is a service offered, not a past result. If you want to scope a practical first project, dgm can help you map it out.