| Three successful deals out of EASY proves value of the project |
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One of the most interesting things about early stage investing is that angels and venture capitalists can find valuable opportunities in the most unusual of places or sectors. This serendipity is what makes early stage investing so exciting. For the EASY Project, we have all been waiting eagerly to find out which of the companies would be the first to receive funding and it has come as no surprise that the first three deals have been in companies from totally different sectors! The first deal to be announced was Lisa Airplanes which raised funding of €1.2m via a syndicate of investors organised by RAC Ingenierie. In an exciting and novel development, the syndicate included an Italian investor who came across the opportunity via the EASY Project investment meeting held in Helsinki, Finland in June 2007. The other members of the syndicate comprised French business angels and seed funds. The Italian investor was warmly welcomed into the syndicate, not just because of the funds he invested but also because he is very experienced in the aviation industry and provides links for the company into Italy, which is a major target market. Lisa Airplanes, founded in 2005 is developing a new airplane technology under the leadership of fellow entrepreneurs Erick HERZBERGER and Luc BERNOLE, with the objective of providing an ultra-light aircraft (l'AKOYA) for leisure and business, dedicated to a wide range of users. It has already won awards for its Intellectual Property and its unique design. There is interest in l’AKOYA on both sides of the Atlantic. This is the second major round of funding the company has received, but the first which included a business angel from another country. The round has been structured so that €400,000 was invested immediately and a further €800,000 in spring 2008, when certain milestones are met. The funding followed six months of negotiations with investors. Just as we had finished celebrating this first deal we heard news that two other companies had raised funding. UK based Orteq, run by Dianne Blanco, also presented at the Helsinki event. It has formulated Actifit™ to be a resilient, flexible, highly porous, biodegradable and chemically benign synthetic polymeric scaffold, through which blood vessels can rapidly grow. The opportunity attracted the attention of of a Dutch director of a London based investment bank who had attended the EASY event as a business angel. Through his discussions with three Dutch business angels, he attracted them to Orteq and they invested alongside the OLK Medical Fund and several other business angels. Lastly the most recent deal is Czech Republic based internet start-up 360cities.net, run by Jeffrey Martin and Steve Hercher. This was the third deal for EASY, but it was the very first deal by a formal angel group in the Czech Republic! Following the presentation at the Helsinki EASY meeting where 360cities.net was voted one of the most popular opportunities by over 200 angel investors, the company entered into negotiations with investors in several countries. This resulted in an investment in the business by 10 angels, led by Finnish investor Ari Korhonen and a group of Dutch investors led by Pieter Angenent and Lex de Lange, members of the Dutch network, Tifan. Also investing is the Prague-based investor Anthony Smith, the first to commit to the deal. They have invested through 360 Cities B.V. a Dutch-registered company, which sealed the opportunity as one where pan-European co-operation really can work. |