Global Finance raises 300m euros

Greek company Global Finance is to launch an investment fund with a capitalisation of 300 million euros that will be one of the largest funds aimed at Romania and markets in the region.

The new fund will target Romanian entrepreneurs keen to expand beyond Romania”s borders, given that Romanian companies do not have much of a presence in Central and Eastern Europe compared with their Hungarian, Czech, Russian and Bulgarian counterparts.

The number of Romanian companies focusing on international expansion has so far been small, but includes Rompetrol (petroleum), Flamingo (IT) and, more recently, Petrom (petroleum), while Mobexpert (furniture) and Altex (retail) have also announced similar plans for the near future.

“We are at an advanced stage in terms of closing a 300 million euro fund focused on Romania, Bulgaria and Greece that will complement Global Finance”s portfolio. This will allow us not only to deal with a wide range of industries, but also to work with companies of very different sizes, with our investment being between 0.5 and 50 million euros in each case. One of the main investment directions is to identify Romanian entrepreneurs that we can take to the markets in the region, just as we brought Greek investors to this area,” Stefan Bucataru, country manager of Global Finance for Romania, explained for Ziarul Financiar. He went on to say that the life span of the new fund would be 10 years and would see financial investors interested to acquire both minority and majority stakes in the companies targeted.

The investors in the new fund raised by Global Finance include Harbour Vest Partners, investment bank Goldman Sachs, UBS-Brinson, investment fund Adam Street Partners, Abu Dhabi”s Investment Authority, insurance company Standard Life, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, and International Finance Corporation (the investment arm of the World Bank).

Global Finance”s investment strategy looks to sectors with high growth potential on fast-developing markets and from a wide range of industries, including pharmaceuticals, retail, telecommunications and financial services. A regional fund focusing exclusively on real estate was also launched recently with a capitalisation of 125 million euros.

Global Finance has been one of the most active financial investors in Romania this year after conducting a number of transactions through the funds it runs.