Gemisa Investments, a venture capital fund, is considering increasing its value from six million euros to 15 million euros in order to back the investments it has made and to raise money for new projects.
"This will most likely happen by the end of 2006," Dragos Rosca, Gemisa CEO, told ZIARUL FINANCIAR.
The fund will boost investments in the ten companies its portfolio currently includes and will, on the other hand, seek new projects. "The average investment per project will increase," states Rosca.
At the time Gemisa was created (October 2004), Rosca said he was going to invest the six million euros in about 15-20 start-ups, with the average value per project being initially put at 300,000 euros. At that time, the minimum value of an investment stood at 50,000 euros, while the maximum investment was of one million euros, a value that has been already exceeded.
So far, Gemisa has invested 3.5 million euros and has earmarked another 1.5 million euros for the following period. "We''ve almost invested all the money we had originally allotted for investments," comments Gemisa CEO.
So far, the company has invested in start-ups in the services sector, which generally exploit a market niche. The services sector is targeted by an increasingly larger number of investors owing to its high potential.
The new money to be raised from investors, foreign-held financial companies, will be used both to finance the second development stage of existing projects, and for the diversification of the portfolio. Projects targeted for the future will also include industrial companies (such as those in the production sector, for instance).
As the sums invested in each project will increase, the total number of companies included in the fund''s portfolio will not grow considerably and the initially set target of 20 companies will remain unchanged.
Unlike other investment funds, such as the capital development funds, Gemisa has purchased the majority stake in the companies it saw as interesting. At this moment, the fund owns stakes in the following companies: Miniblu (children''s products retail), Optical Network (sight and sun glasses distributed under Optiblu brand), Cristal Diagnostic (labour medicine and medical clinic), Oxigen Plus (medical services for chronic patients), Press Pro International (medical press publishing house and an event organiser), Fleet Management services (car fleet management), BIA Human Resource Management Services (HR consulting services), Lauren Finance (financial services).
Pentru alte știri, analize, articole și informații din business în timp real urmărește Ziarul Financiar pe WhatsApp Channels
