Brella, developer of a networking application for business events that was founded in Jyväskylä, Finland, in 2016, has raised €1.2 million in private equity. The lead investor was Vendep Capital together with a team of international angel investors, including from the USA, France and Finland.

The investment will allow Brella to expand its operations in the USA, which is already the conmpany’s most important market. In addition, the company will be able to hire over a dozen product developers, as well as sales and marketing staff, in Finland.

The idea for the service was born when the company’s founders attended numerous business events while studying but generally came away from these events with a lot of marketing material instead of good contacts.

Markus Kauppinen, CEO of Brella, explains: “Events have been the best way to bring together people and ideas for thousands of years, yet until now no one has created a service that could intelligently analyse event visitors and their needs in advance, making it easier to find the best contacts among all the people attending the event.”

Today the service has users in over thirty countries around the world, and its customers include Slush, Samsung, Microsoft and TechCrunch.

The company’s aim is to enable 100 million new business contacts by 2020.

“Networking is valued in the USA even more than it is in Finland. Unlike in Finland, it is often difficult to find the contact information for decision-makers, so events offer a rare opportunity to actually meet them,” says Jyrki Paananen, COO of Brella.

“As the lead investor, we wanted to support a great team and invest in their ambitious growth plan. The market demand for this service was proven by Brella’s tremendous international growth in its first year, when it attracted almost a hundred clients,” says Sakari Pihlava, General Partner, Vendep Capital.

Further information:

Markus Kauppinen, CEO, Brella
+358405749287
markus@brella.io

Sakari Pihlava, General Partner, Vendep Capital
+358407713941
sakari.pihlava@vendep.com

Brella is a networking application for business events. The service helps event visitors to grow their business network and meet relevant people by means of an intelligent matchmaking algorithm. The mobile and web application has helped hundreds of thousands of people to find jobs, colleagues, investors, and other business contacts. www.brella.io

Vendep Capital Fund invests primarily in Finnish startups offering software to B2B customers. In April 2017, Vendep Capital launched a new €40 million fund aimed at SaaS startups. The fund was raised from Finnish private and institutional investors such as Tesi (Finnish Industry Investment Ltd) and The Finnish Innovation Fund Sitra. The fund may make investments alone or as part of a syndicate. www.vendep.com

Tesi (Finnish Industry Investment Ltd) is a venture capital and private equity company that accelerates companies’ success stories by investing in them directly and via funds. Tesi always invests together with other investors, providing them with access to high quality deal flow in Finland. Our investments under management total 1 billion euros and we have altogether 723 companies in portfolio. www.tesi.fi // @TesiFII

Standout Capital acquires a majority stake in Exsitec, a leading provider of business system software to medium sized companies in Sweden. Standout Capital looks forward to support Exsitec’s continued commitment to provide high quality services to current and future customers and to fuel the continued growth and development of the company. Following the transaction Standout Capital holds 55% of the shares in Exsitec and former owners and management will retain a 45% ownership in the company.

Exsitec is a leading provider of business system software, including ERP, business intelligence and mobile solutions for medium-sized companies in Sweden. The Company’s customer base consists of over 500 companies across several industries and includes many renowned enterprises including Fonus, Linas Matkasse and Tele2 Business.

“We have grown from SEK 30 million to nearly SEK 130 million in sales over the past five years, and want to bring both financial muscle and expertise in expanding the company to the next level”, said Chairman Peter Viberg.

“Our business is about helping our clients in software selection, making sure they are successful in the implementations and taking responsibility for long term support and maintenance. In the coming years, we plan to add additional offers in our portfolio and expand geographically. Standout Capital’s focus on Nordic technology companies makes them a perfect partner for us, and they can bring expertise and resources to help us reach new markets faster. Standout Capital show a deep interest in understanding our customers, our business and our corporate culture, and have been easy to work with in this process”, says CEO Johan Kallblad.

 “Exsitec has displayed impressive growth supported by its strong niche expertise and its outstanding track record of successfully serving its customers. Standout ultimately invests in the digitisation of business and society, and Exsitec is a good example of a successful company with solid prospects for capitalizing on this trend and in a market niche where we are confident to add substantial value. We believe there are significant opportunities to continue growing and developing Exsitec further and we look forward to work with the competent and dedicated team of management and employees to fully realize the potential of the company”, says Standout Capital’s partner Klas Hillström.

Contacts and further information

Klas Hillström, Partner, Standout Capital, +46 70 508 77 12, klas.hillstrom@standoutcapital.com
Johan Kallblad, CEO, Exsitec, +46 706 65 99 09, johan.kallblad@exsitec.se

About Exsitec – Exsitec specializes in enterprise systems including ERP, business intelligence and mobile solutions. The company helps its customers choosing the right IT systems tailored to the customer’s business, making sure that everything works together and takes responsibility for the delivery and support. Exsitec has a nationwide delivery organization with 120 employees with combined expertise in IT and business management. They use leading systems like Visma Business, Visma.net, QlikView / Sense Effect Plan, Mobigo and MediusFlow. Exsitec is headquartered in Linköping and has regional offices in Stockholm, Gothenburg, Malmö, Örebro, Sundsvall and Söderhamn. www.exsitec.se

About Standout Capital – Standout Capital is a Stockholm-based private equity firm investing in growing Nordic tech companies. As an active owner, our mission is to partner with outstanding companies to help them grow and succeed. Standout Capital’s investment strategy is to support the digital transformation in business and society. The founders and investment team build on experience in entrepreneurship, investments and finance. The Standout Capital I fund is SEK 1 billion. www.standoutcapital.com

Standout Capital I AB benefits from the support of the European Union under the Equity Facility for Growth established under Regulation (EU) No 1287/2013 of the European Parliament and the Council establishing a Programme for the Competitiveness of Enterprises and small and medium enterprises (COSME) (2014-2020)

Partners Group to acquire Civica, a leading UK-based provider of software and services

London, July 13th 2017 – Ardian, the independent private investment company, today announced the arrangement of a Senior Debt financing facility to finance Castik Capital’s carve-out acquisition of Wolters Kluwer Transport Services (“WKTS”), a leading European-focused provider of logistics management cloud-based software platforms. The financing marks the beginning of Ardian Private Debt’s Senior Debt direct lending capabilities.

WKTS was founded in 1985 under the name Teleroute, primarily offering Freight Exchange (“FX”) solutions. The Company was acquired by the Wolters Kluwer Group in 1989, which led an expansion of its product portfolio to include Transportation Management Software (“TMS”) solutions, whilst also driving strong business growth both organically and through selective M&A. Under the ownership of the Wolters Kluwer Group, WKTS has significantly expanded its geographical presence throughout Europe, and has recently expanded internationally into the US, China, and Latin America. The company currently serves more than 100,000 users across 80 countries.

WKTS primarily focuses on end-customers transporting large volumes of low value goods, where both shippers and carriers benefit significantly from managing transport volumes through web-based platforms. Within the broader market, WKTS is focused on cloud-based platforms, covering ‘matching’ through its FX platform, and ‘logistics management networks’ through its TMS platform.

ABOUT WKTS

WKTS, founded in 1985 and headquartered in Brussels, provides its customers with “on demand” Transportation Management Software and Services, equally catering for all transport and logistics professionals. With over 100,000 users across 80 countries, and through the breadth of their service offerings, WKTS is one of the few providers able to address the needs of the entire logistics supply chain via carriers, freight forwarders, logistics providers, and shippers.

www.wktransportservices.com

ABOUT ARDIAN

Ardian, founded in 1996 and led by Dominique Senequier, is an independent private investment company with assets of US$62 billion managed or advised in Europe, North America and Asia. The company, which is majority-owned by its employees, keeps entrepreneurship at its heart and delivers investment performance to its global investors while fuelling growth in economies across the world. Ardian’s investment process embodies three values: excellence, loyalty and entrepreneurship.

Ardian maintains a truly global network, with more than 460 employees working through twelve offices in Beijing, Frankfurt, Jersey, London, Luxembourg, Madrid, Milan, New York, Paris, San Francisco, Singapore and Zurich. The company offers its 580 investors a diversified choice of funds covering the full range of asset classes, including Ardian Funds of Funds (primary, early secondary and secondary), Ardian Private Debt, Ardian North America Direct Buyout, Direct Funds (Ardian Mid Cap Buyout, Ardian Expansion, Ardian Growth, Ardian Co-Investment), Ardian Infrastructure, Ardian Real Estate and customized mandate solutions with Ardian Mandates.

www.ardian.com

ABOUT CASTIK

Castik Capital, founded in 2014, is based in Luxembourg and focuses on identifying and developing investment opportunities across Europe. The advisor to Castik Capital is Castik Capital Partners GmbH, based in Munich. The professionals of Castik Capital and Castik Capital Partners have worked together for many years and collectively the partners have more than 100 years of relevant experience in private equity, industry, consulting, and banking.

Funds managed by Castik Capital aim to deliver superior returns through a flexible, focused, and long-term approach to investing and value creation.

Castik Capital is currently investing out of its first fund which has a volume of €1 billion.

www.castik.lu

Viking Venture exits EcoOnline at 10 times the investment

Viking Venture, the Norwegian B2B software specialist, is happy to announce its divestiture of chemical management software provider EcoOnline AS to Summa Equity. After developing the company into a rapidly growing undisputed market leader in the Nordics, Viking Venture exits at 10 times the investment in 2.5 years. Viking Venture reinvests parts of the proceeds in EcoOnline to facilitate further growth in the Nordics and to establish a leading position in Europe. 

EcoOnline is sold to Summa Equities, a leading Nordic private equity firm, in an all cash transaction valuing EcoOnline at NOK 355 million. Viking Venture owned 64% of EcoOnline prior to the transaction.

– The sale of EcoOnline is a highly successful exit, yielding 10 times return on our investment in only 2.5 years, says Erik Hagen, managing partner of Viking Venture and the former chairman of the board of EcoOnline.

– With Summa Equity as a strong partner we will continue the rapid growth in our existing markets and are ready to expand into Europe, says Jostein Vik, partner of Viking Venture and former board member of EcoOnline. – We want to take part in the continued value creation and are reinvesting a substantial sum together with management”.

Summa will own 69% of the shares after the transaction while Viking Venture retains 23%. The remaining 8% is owned by management and employees.

BlackFin Capital Partners announces the acquisition of Buckaroo

BlackFin Capital Partners has entered into an agreement with Intrum Justitia to acquire 100% of the shares in Buckaroo BV. The acquisition will be subject to customary closing conditions and regulatory approval, with an expected closing during the third quarter of 2017.

Buckaroo is a leading and multiple award winning Dutch payment service provider servicing over 5000 merchants. Buckaroo has grown into the absolute specialist in payment solutions in recent years. Many corporates and medium-sized companies use Buckaroo to facilitate their growth in business in ecommerce, mobile business or offline business.

BlackFin, a private equity firm specialized in the financial services & fintech sector, is deeply committed to invest in Buckaroo in order to accelerate the company’s growth strategy together with the management team. This will enable Buckaroo to capitalize on the fast growing e-commerce segment and the rapidly evolving payment space.

“We are pleased with BlackFin as our new shareholder. With their expertise and track record in accelerating growth we will embark on an ambitious growth strategy for Buckaroo and expand the service offering to clients.” Andre Valkenburg, CEO Buckaroo

“This investment marks our strong interest in the attractive payments space in the Netherlands. We are looking forward to working together with the management team of Buckaroo and support them in realizing their exciting growth path.” Eric May, Founding Partner of BlackFin

BlackFin’s investment in Buckaroo also marks BlackFin’s first investment in the Netherlands led by the Benelux team of BlackFin. During the deal, BlackFin Capital was advised by Kempen & Co, Loyens & Loeff, Regulation Partners and Ernst & Young.

About Buckaroo

Founded in 2005, Buckaroo is a leading provider of payment solutions in the Netherlands, specialised in offering next generation payment gateways, subscription services and credit management for merchants. It services over 5000 customers and has over 200 partners. Buckaroo has been recognised as Best Payment Provider in the Netherlands by Emerce Top 100 for the last four years.

https://www.buckaroo-payments.com