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| Sunday, 6 April 2003 |
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| News Business Features Editorial
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South Asia Fund for SMEs Aureos Captal Ltd, a global manager of Small and Medium Enterprises (SME) private equity funds in emerging markets, is currently evaluating the development of a regional South Asia Fund, which will seek to make SME private equity investments in Sri Lanka, India, Bangladesh and Maldives. These funds will be managed by a local team, enhancing the fund's ability to source deals and adopt a 'hands on' approach to portfolio management. Aureos Capital a 50 per cent stake in Ayojana Fund Management (Pvt) Ltd. from CDC Capital Partners (previously, the Commonwealth Development Corporation) in July 2001. It is now jointly managing Ayojana with the National Development Bank (NDB). Ayojana Fund Management a SME private equity fund manager in Sri Lanka, was established in 1996 as a joint venture between the NDB and CDC Capital Partners. Ayojana currently manages two private equity capital funds NDB Venture Investments (Pvt) Ltd. and Ayojana Fund (Pvt) Ltd. with a committed capital of Rs. 930 million. The funds have invested across a wide range of sectors including information technology, hotels and tourism, manufacturing and property development. Key investments in the portfolio include Millennium Information Technologies, Aqua Packaging Pvt. Ltd., Hayleys MGT Textiles Ltd. and Union Resorts Pvt. Ltd. Successful realisations of investments to date include Lion Brewery, Ceylon Brewery and Associated Autoways. Ayojana paid Rs. 100 million as dividends and returned Rs. 180 million of share capital to the fund's investors last year. Aureos Capital has 15 funds under management and total committed capital of US $202 million. It is a 50/50 joint venture between CDC Group Plc and Norfund, the Norwegian Investment Fund for developing countries, and was set up to manage and expand a pool of SME funds originally sponsored by CDC. It is based in the United Kingdom. Building on the success of funds such as Ayojana, Aureos Capital is expanding its business from country specific funds to regional funds. The soundness of this strategy led to the successful launch of the US $38 million, Aureos Central America Fund in July 2002. |
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