Private Equity in South-East Europe is alive and well. There are few talks in media on the recent acquisitions in the South-East region. One of them includes Nikos Stathopoulis, chairman of BC Partners’ portfolio management committee. Moreover, Nikos is also a chairman of Serbia based United Group and leads media and telecoms. Last year, there were two major acquisitions in the region. One was Tele 2 Croatia for an enterprise value of €220 million. While the other one was for Bulgarian service provider Vivacom for a reported enterprise value of €1.2 billion.
Meanwhile, a Pharmaceutical company Zentiva Group completed the acquisition of Alvogen’s CEE business in Romania, Bulgaria, Croatia and several other countries.
Private-equity (PE) investors own companies but are not like those that raise money by selling their shares in stock exchanges. There is a big difference. Public companies are those that shareholders list on publicly available registers. Secondly, listed companies make regular announcements. If they’re backed by private equity, there’s no need to do so: it’s all private. Therefore, Private Equity backed companies tend to value that freedom.
Private equity investments in CEE companies
Private equity and venture capital investment into companies in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) reached a record €3.5 billion in 2017, according to data from Invest Europe.
From the Invest Europe, 2018 Report, 3,750 European companies exited in 2018, a 3% decrease on the previous year. By the amount of former equity investment (divestment at cost), the total value was €32bn, a year-on-year decrease of 28%. The most prominent exit routes by the amount at cost were trade sale (32%), sale to another private equity firm (31%) and public offering (10%).
Buyout funds in the region raised a total of €1.1 billion, whilst CEE venture capital funds attracted over €500 million of investor cash for the second year in a row.
The number of private equity and venture capital-backed exits in CEE reached an all-time high with a total of 128 companies divested in 2018. With an exit value of €575 million, Poland accounted for nearly half of all exit activity. The biotech and healthcare sector took the lion’s share of CEE private equity investment, making up just over 30% of the total value for the year. Consumer goods and services companies also fared well, receiving 27% of the overall funding.
What is private equity looking for in 2020?
According to online media, private equity markets are looking for technology companies where covid-19 is not worthy of mention.
It will be some time yet before the bargain hunters are searching for opportunities in manufacturing industries with complex, international supply chains. Meanwhile, creditors will be more focused on a conservative business plan for the underlying companies.
Overall we maintain a positive outlook for the performance of new commitments to private equity in 2020. Investors’ emphasis on ESG will increase further in 2020. That also aligns well with private equity’s long timeframes and higher engagement. This is becoming especially important for private equity in CEE; Central and Eastern Europe.
As we mentioned in the previous article on ESG growth, heightened awareness of climate change are important drivers of change. Nevertheless, the European Commission’s Sustainable Finance initiative is as well, highly important driver.
According to Pitchbook, private equity is on a long-term growth trend, and there seems to be little that will stop it. Private equity has long been an important contributor to value creation in the real economy and for investors’ portfolios alike.
