Canadian venture capital firm Portag3 Ventures has appointed Chris O’Neill as partner in an effort to shore up its presence in Silicon Valley.

The Toronto-based firm, which recently closed its second fintech fund — valued at $320 million — focuses on direct-to-consumer fintech startups, as well as financial infrastructure companies. It has been on pace to grow its global brand and source deals beyond its home base in Canada.

Portag3 CEO Adam Felesky said in a statement that the hire will help expand the company’s geographic reach and help “plant a flag” within the Silicon Valley ecosystem. The geographic spread of Portag3’s second fund investments are 50% in North America, 40% in Europe and 10% in Asia, Felesky recently told Bank Innovation.

O’Neill comes to Portag3 as a previous angel investor and adviser to several tech companies. He also helped build AI company Layer 6, which was acquired by TD Bank and Relay, which was acquired by Kik. O’Neill was also instrumental in building Helpful, which was later acquired by Shopify. In addition, he served as chairman and CEO of Evernote and spent a decade working in senior roles at Google.

See also: Portag3 Ventures closes $320m fund for consumer and infrastructure plays

O’Neill told Bank Innovation he intends to use his role at Portag3 to strengthen links between the Canadian fintech ecosystem and Silicon Valley, connecting promising startups with investment opportunities and capitalizing on synergies derived from Portag3’s global footprint. In addition to sourcing deals from Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, the firm also intends to help connect Valley companies with Canadian talent resources, O’Neill added.

“The need is to have a presence in the Valley so that we can better handle all the inbound interest, but also shape our investment thesis on the ground here in the Valley,” he said.

Having a base in Silicon Valley is an important part of the Portag3’s global expansion strategy and a means to help promote its offerings to the fintech community there. While he didn’t offer specifics on Portag3’s plans in Silicon Valley, O’Neill noted that a key objective will be to raise the profile of the brand.

“From a marketing perspective, you have to differentiate yourself,” explained O’Neill. “There’s no shortage of capital in the world today, and I think that the bar has gone up in terms of the need to be truly differentiated.”

As concerns Portag3’s core areas of focus — both consumer and business-facing companies — he suggested that recent developments demonstrate that both fields have considerable room for growth.

“We’re in the early innings,” O’Neill said. “Some of the exits we’ve seen with Plaid and with Credit Karma speak to the importance of both infrastructure and direct-to-consumer propositions.”

To date, Portag3’s second fund has made investments in 17 companies, including banking startup Koho, insurance platform Clark, enterprise software company Integrate.ai and Diagram Ventures. Through Portag3’s first fund, which was valued at CA$198 million ($150 million) the firm invested in large fintech startups, including Borrowell, Wealthsimple and Clearbanc.

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