DELIA is derived from the acronym: Develop, Educate, Lead, Innovate and Accelerate, which defines the nucleus of the DELIA project from inception. The next layer of meaning derives from Artemis, the ancient Greek goddess of the hunt. DELIA is one of her many and diverse titles, meaning ‘from Delos’, the island where she was born. When we think of DELIA in this sense, we think of a strong deal for Women entrepreneurs who are on “the hunt” to access capital for their ventures. With the support of the Government of Canada’s Women Entrepreneurship Strategy, we are pursuing gender equity in economic advancement. The DELIA brand encompasses all of this and more.

With the support of The Federal Economic Development Agency for Southern Ontario (FedDev Ontario) and the Government of Canada’s Women Entrepreneurship Strategy, NCFDC partnered with CORL to develop a fintech-driven microloan platform that would help to address the access to capital gap for Women-owned enterprises across Southern Ontario.

Our pilot project in 2019-2020 backed 42 companies with $675,000 in targeted microloans. The result: DELIA ventures soared.

Fast forward to today, with the support of Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada (ISED Canada), we are now able to make DELIA available across all of Canada. Our goal is to ensure that by 2024, DELIA stands as a revolving and evergreen microloan fund for all Canadian Women entrepreneurs for start up, stabilization and expansion. DELIA will take its place alongside StrikeUP Canada (NCFDC’s annual digital conference for Women entrepreneurs) as part of our commitment to gender equity in economic advancement.