Dax Dasilva was born in Vancouver to parents who had fled Idi Amin's Uganda in 1972. At 13 he began apprenticing for a software developer. At the University of British Columbia he started in computer science and moved to art history and religion.
He founded Lightspeed in Montreal in 2005. Accel Partners led a $30 million round in 2012, iNovia Capital put in $35 million in 2014 and CDPQ and Investissement Quebec led a $61 million Series C in 2015.
Lightspeed bought the Belgian restaurant software firm POSIOS in 2014 and the Dutch e-commerce firm SEOShop in 2015. It listed on the TSX in March 2019, then bought ShopKeep for $440 million in 2020 and Vend for $350 million in 2021.
Short seller Spruce Point Capital attacked the company in September 2021. Dasilva stepped down as CEO in February 2022 and became executive chair. Layoffs of about 300 followed in January 2023 and 10% of staff in April 2024.