How did capitalism encourage colonization and exploration?

Capitalism partially helped to encourage colonization and exploration, but at the time the European countries were following policies of Mercantilism and not necessarily Capitalism. Mercantilism was an economic policy that saw economics as a zero sum game whereby the goal was to export as much as possible and import as little as possible so that countries could accumulate as much gold as possible to support their militaries. Therefore, colonization helped to increase raw materials and new markets for the European countries. Initially exploration was led by the search for new markets and new opportunities for economic expansion under mercantilist policies.