AI startup Cohere said it has raised an additional $100 million from investors including Business Development Bank of Canada (BDC) and Nexxus Capital Management as part of its second close to its latest funding round announced in August.

This funding round has taken the startup's valuation to around $7 billion, said Cohere in a statement.

Cohere will use the fresh capital to boost the development and global adoption of its security-first enterprise AI technology across the public and private sectors.

It added that the company is rapidly expanding its operations in North America, APAC and EMEA.

The second close of its funding round comes after the company last month said it had raised $500 million at a $6.8 billion valuation in an oversubscribed round led by Radical Ventures and Inovia Capital.

"The strong investor demand following our first close last month is a big endorsement of our momentum deploying secure and sovereign AI for the enterprise,” said Cohere, CFO, Francois Chadwick.

Cohere's other investors include AMD Ventures, Nvidia, PSP Investments, and Salesforce Ventures and Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan.