The online learning provider and the telemedicine firm, which have both seen disproportionate growth during the pandemic, met with investment bankers recently to explore the prospect of going public. The CEOs of both companies are bullish on the idea of an IPO, and say their boards are weeks away from hiring underwriters to start the process, which would likely materialize in 2021. (The Globe and Mail)

Talking point: Kitchener, Ont.-based D2L and Montreal-based Dialogue are pandemic winners because of their virtual technology. Dialogue’s doctor-to-patient services can now be accessed by five million people. D2L said it has seen a 250 per cent increase in the use of its online tools. What they also appear to have going for them is investor appetite for tech IPOs—cloud-based software company Dye & Durham, for example, has seen its stock surge over 250 per cent since it went public in mid-July. But both the telemedicine and e-learning spaces in Canada were already relatively crowded before the pandemic. It’s not clear whether demand for virtual services can be sustained in a post-virus world.