Latin Salsa

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Latin+Salsa

Where Markets Are Hot : Opportunities For VCs ACross The Globe

From China and India to Southeast Europe and Latin America, the upward thrust of huge young populations of middle class patrons is making rich possibilities for personal equity and venture capital backers. Top targets for investment in these new markets include firms in the web, monetary services and clean technology sectors.

These were among the key points of venture capital panelists, many of whom are currently working in developing countries, at the 2011 Wharton Personal Equity and Venture Capital Meeting. Partakers on a panel titled “Challenges and Possibilities for Global Venture Capital” addressed the developing areas of China, India, Southeast Europe, Turkey and Latin America during the session, which was moderated by Jeanne Metzger, director of selling for the national Venture Capital Association in Washington, D.C.

The Net sector is very attractive in China’s vast and speedily growing market, said Andras Forgacs, managing director of Richmond Worldwide a Big Apple City-based venture capital firm that focuses on technology. Forgacs noted that Richmond Worldwide looks for firms with business models that are like the ones that the firm has backed in the U. S. . For instance, Richmond Worldwide has a position in AdChina, a Web advertising company that’s like aQuantive in Seattle, Washington. Richmond Global provided seed money to aQuantive, which Microsoft purchased in 2007.

According to Forgacs, the worst mistake U.S. Firms make when making an investment in China isn’t having their own managers on-site in the country. Corporations too often oversee their investments from outside China, he said, and are so slow to react to changes in the market. This will give local entrepreneurs a competitive advantage.

China’s booming economy puts skilled employees in heavy demand and makes maintaining talent difficult, Forgacs added. Experienced programmers and engineers can easily hop from one employer to another in Shanghai and Beijing, for instance, while other employees may start their own corporations. Competition for employees also comes from well-educated Chinese businessmen who return to their country from abroad and start new companies.

Richmond Global is presently having a look at possibilities in smaller and less frenetic Chinese business hubs like Chengdu. “There are some interesting investing opportunities where there is less in the way of competition and more patient development of companies and talent,” Forgacs asserted. He added that China’s robust public markets give stockholders confidence that they will be able to liquidate their positions. But exits thru mergers and acquisitions are less common, Forgacs noted , because Chinese businessmen are intensely value-conscious and drive a hard bargain.

Clean technologies are a prime source of opportunity in India, expounded Mohanjit Jolly, Director of Draper Fisher Jurvetson in Menlo Park, California. Such technologies include replaceable resources, recycling and pollution-control equipment. Like China, India has a fast-growing economy with a massive developing base of customers. Talks around Indian water coolers aren’t about whether investments will earn returns, said Jolly, but rather about how big the returns will be. “It’s a phenomenal time to be in India and part of the ecosystem,” he revealed.

Keeping talented employees is difficult in India, claimed Jolly, since staff are typically happy to jump to companies that offer even slightly higher pay. Jolly hopes to set up a vesting plan for workers of Draper Fisher’s portfolio firms that rewards them with growing amounts of equity the longer they stay. However , India remains a cash-based economy when it comes to compensation, Jolly noted. “That’s the actuality. How it morphs is yet to be seen.”

Like China, India has tough public markets that attract capital to young firms and provide moneymaking exits for stockholders. Local groups of angel backers also are forming to take a position in early-stage corporations and fill an established opening in starting capital. Jolly declared venture capital funds are using these groups as a “fertile deal flow mechanism” by getting familiar with them and using them as leads to good companies.

Finance services provide the most enthralling possibilities for investment in Southeast Europe and Turkey, related Denis Kalenja, founder and managing partner of Montague Capital Partners, which has offices in NY Town and Research Triangle Park in North Carolina. Commercial banking has performed well in the region, which Kalenja said still requires more financial services like asset management firms. He added that troubled real estate, including beachfront property on the Adriatic coast of Croatia, may supply an excellent chance for financiers who are acquainted with the area. Here is the perfect place to have Croatia real estate.

Southeast Europe remains a fragmented market made from many tiny countries with populations that talk different languages, Kalenja noted. The region’s industries so have a critical need to consolidate to build economies of increased scale and generate worth for financiers. But in the boom years before the global monetary crash, local managers thought they could build corporations all alone without partnering across borders, he said. Now executives are way more willing to consider fusions. “The folk in this area realized they can not do it themselves. Eventually, the area is ready for investing and consolidation.”

Venture capitalists who come to Southeast Europe can easily find three or 4 families or entrepreneurs that rule particular industries, he announced. This could provide a starting point for coming to the market with investments that help enterprises consolidate.

Stockholders based in Western Europe are looking toward the southeast for higher returns, Kalenja noted. But such investors frequently lack experience in local markets. In the meantime, lots of the most accomplished and highly educated businesspeople in Southeast Europe and Turkey are moving in the opposite direction by relocating to bigger markets in Western Europe and NorthAmerica. This leaves fewer native-born entrepreneurs who are prepared to stay in the area or return from abroad to launch new firms.

Interesting venture opportunities in Latin America include investments in corporations that provide clean energy, water, natural gas and sustainable agriculture, recounted Benjamin Sessions, M. D of the Global Environment Fund in Chevy Chase, Maryland. Latin America is only now embarking on the process of curbing pollution that the U. S. went thru in the 1960s and 1970s, Sessions noted. This is critical for the area, since its commercial growth hasn’t been “matched by the environmental infrastructure and services needed to sustain that growth.”

Talented Latin American employees generally like cash to equity compensation, he added, which can strain the resources of early-stage companies. Workers “value cash in their pocket,” said Sessions. “Giving options or ownership doesn’t always have the specified impact.” But this appears to be steadily changing, he observed, as successful public offerings show that equity stakes can grow in value.

Other opportunities in Latin America come from the service and producing sectors, announced Roberto Woldenberg, handling partner of Indigo Capital in N. Y Town. “We are very pumped up about the area,” recounted Woldenberg, who concentrates on Mexico, Central America and Bolivia. “There are some challenges in social, economic and political issues, but generally we see a lot of bright spots.”

Latin American economies would possibly not be growing at the same impressive rate as China and India, Woldenberg noted , but the economies nevertheless “have their act together in fundamental ways.” Countries in the region are characterized by fresh work forces and decreased levels of debt, he said. “Compared to the West, they have the potential for growth…. The venture capital industry in this part of the planet is in a incipient stage”, as reported tagza.com.

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