Immigrants waiting years to become permanent residents after applying to start-up visa program. Here’s one entrepreneur’s story

Immigration lawyer Stephen Green speaks about the shortcomings of Canada's start-Up visa program.

Canada’s Start-up Visa Program was intended to attract innovative entrepreneurs to the country, but immigration experts are concerned about the lengthy delays some applicants are facing in securing their work permits and permanent residency.

Applicants can obtain work permits as they await a decision on their permanent residency applications. But those with work permits face more roadblocks in attempting to set up their business and receive funding than permanent residents, according to Stephen Green, past chair of the Canadian Bar Association’s national section on citizenship and immigration.

The federal government’s Start-Up Visa Program is currently the only way business entrepreneurs or senior executives can apply to come to Canada, said Green, who is a member of the Canadian Immigration Lawyers Association and managing partner of Toronto-based firm Green and Spiegel.

In a video interview with CTVNews.ca on Tuesday, he said some provinces have a business program that grants work permits, but there are hurdles.

“There’s a lot of difficulty when someone’s trying to establish a business in a province,” he said. “They may want funding for their business, and a lot of the banks won’t give funding to people that are just on work permits.”

He said the government has limited resources because it has cut back on economic immigration.

“Therefore, the lines have gotten much larger with respect to the Start-up Visa, and it’s really affecting the ability of innovative people to come to Canada and help us economically in Canada,” Green said.

The federal government’s Start-up Visa Program aims to attract immigrant entrepreneurs to Canada. Since it was created in 2013, more than 900 start-ups have launched and more than 3,000 entrepreneurs have become permanent residents through the program.

Foreign entrepreneurs are eligible to apply if they have the committed support of a designated venture capital fund, with an investment of $200,000; an angel investor group, with an investment of $75,000; or a business incubator.

The work permit allows Start-up Visa applicants to establish their business in the country while they wait for a decision on their permanent residence applications.

Afeez Moradeyo described his experience with the program as a “fantastic journey” overall, but he said the long wait made him consider abandoning his application for Canada. He applied to Canada’s Start-up Visa Program to launch his business when he was living in Dubai.

It took about two years and six months for him to get his work permit in Canada in April 2023.

“It’s really too long,” the fintech entrepreneur said in a video interview Wednesday about the wait. “It’s draining but still worth it.”

“More priorities should be given to start-up visa applicants in the course of their immigration processing because the wait period is really, really, discouraging,” Moradeyo said from Peterborough, Ont.

“It’s not just about bringing in bright ideas that would further transform the tech ecosystem in Canada, but also, the amount of investments put into it. So that consideration should be given when it comes to immigration processing so that Canada does not have to lose brilliant minds that could further contribute greatly to the economy here.”

Push for changes to program

Judy Han, an expert on immigrant entrepreneurship and an assistant professor of strategy management at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ont., told CTVNews.ca in a video interview that the program should target more “quality” start-ups that can scale globally to make the program more efficient.

Marvin Ryder, a professor of marketing and entrepreneurship at McMaster’s DeGroote School of Business, said the program is “well-designed” but has attracted more applicants than expected.

“So the people who have entered the program with the best of intention are getting more frustrated and more frustrated and more frustrated because of the amount of time it’s taking to be validated and approved,” Ryder said in a video interview with CTVNews.ca.

Ryder said the problem could be fixed easily.

“Just resource the program properly, staff it with the right number of people, deal with this backlog, and instantly it would become a much bigger winner than it already is,” he said.

Immigration cap

As of July 22, the program has nearly 42,200 applications, according to Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC). Of that group, about 16,370 applications have been received but have not yet been finalized for more than 24 months.

To address the backlog and growing wait times, the federal government said it has capped the number of start-ups that designated organizations can support to 10 each year.

“The number of Start-up Visa applications in the program inventory far outnumber the number of planned admissions spaces, which has led to a backlog and longer wait times,” wrote IRCC spokesperson Remi Lariviere in an email to CTVNews.ca on Wednesday. “We have taken a number of steps to limit growth of the Start-up Visa backlog and mitigate wait times by significantly limiting intake under the program and introducing prioritization criteria.”

The federal government is prioritizing the return of immigration to sustainable levels while attracting top talent, Lariviere added. He noted that the target number of federal business admissions set out in the Immigration Levels Plan, which includes both the Start-up Visa and Self Employed programs, was reduced to 2,000 in 2025 and 1,000 in 2026, from 6,000 in 2024.

In the government’s December 2023 report evaluating the program, it acknowledged the longer processing times and backlogs as challenges hurting the program’s “competitiveness and attractiveness.”