BDO Development Capital Fund to focus on investing in Irish SMEs
The Minister for Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation, Richard Bruton TD, today
(Monday) launched a €75 million fund under the Development Capital Scheme,
to support established Irish companies targeting significant revenue and
jobs growth through export markets. The development and roll out of the
Scheme is a critical element in the Action Plan for Jobs.
The BDO Development Capital Fund, which will be managed by Development
Capital, a 100% subsidiary of BDO, will invest development and growth
capital in established, mid-sized and profitable companies to support and
accelerate their export growth plans. It breaks new ground for an
enterprise investment fund which in addition to an experienced investment
team brings together a blue chip partnership of large Irish corporates and
industry experts who, together with Enterprise Ireland, will provide not
only funding but also the necessary experience, expertise and international
reach to assist secure business growth opportunities. The corporate
partners to the fund include Bank of Ireland, CRH plc, Glanbia plc and Glen
Dimplex.
In addition to the corporate partners the investee companies will have
access to proven industry experts who have created, grown and developed
Irish companies into international success stories comprising: Denis
Brosnan (former CEO of Kerry Foods), Alan Crosbie (Former Chairman Irish
Examiner and family business expert), Dr. Noel Kelly (former Executive
Director of Kentz), Dr Jim Mountjoy (founder of Euristix) and Helen Ryan
(former CEO Creganna Tactx Medical). The Development Capital Investment
Directors are supported by an Investment Committee chaired by Eoin
O’Driscoll (Chairman of SWS).
Target companies for investment will be Irish and have significant
opportunities for jobs and export growth. Typically companies will be
mid-sized, with high-growth potential and annual turnover of €15million to
€50million. Based on the current growth opportunities it is likely that
the majority of investments will come from the food and agri; life sciences
and clean tech; ICT/software and industrial/engineering sectors.
Today’s announcement follows the announcement of the €125million first
Development Capital Fund in November 2013. The Development Capital Scheme
is part of a suite of non-bank sources of finance rolled out under the
Government’s Action Plan for Jobs totalling more than €2billion in funds
available for business.
Making the announcement today, Minister Bruton said:
“As we have repeatedly stated, at the heart of our jobs plans is our
determination to create a powerful engine of Irish enterprise alongside our
strong multinational sector. Around the country we have many excellent
mid-sized businesses in sectors like food, manufacturing and engineering –
but we want to support more of them to grow bigger, export more and employ
more people.
“This new €75million fund from BDO is a major addition to the supports
available to this hugely important sector. Not only will it invest sums of
between €2million and €10million in 15 of these companies, but it will also
provide access to mentoring and other expertise from people who have done
it before. This is a very significant new support that will make a real
difference to businesses in this category, and will help more companies to
grow more, export more, and ultimately create more of the jobs we need”.
Julie Sinnamon, CEO, Enterprise Ireland, commented: “Funding is a critical
component for Irish businesses to win business abroad and to create jobs. I
would like congratulate BDO on bringing together such a unique set of
investors to form the second fund under the Development Capital Scheme. I
know BDO and the advisory board they have formed to support their investee
companies will bring significant added value in helping their investee
companies achieve their growth strategies”.
Sinead Heaney, Founding Director of the BDO Development Capital Fund,
said: “As a funding partner, Development Capital will provide not only
funding to investee companies but also the experience, expertise and
international reach of all the partners in our Fund, namely experienced
investment directors, leading Irish and international Corporates and proven
industry experts. We are confident that this unique approach will leverage
the strengths and expertise of all our partners delivering real market
results in terms of increased export sales and job creation”.
Ms Heaney added: “We recognise the significant growth opportunities
available to mid-sized companies and will invest between €2million and
€10million in approximately 15 investee companies and our team will
actively assist them accelerate and maximise these opportunities. The
investment term will be for a period of five years and we aim to have the
fund fully invested within three years. Where appropriate, we will also be
open to the possibility of leveraging further investment from suitable
co-investment partners such as banks and private equity”.
ENDS
For further information, please contact:
Conor Quinn, Press Advisor to Minister Bruton, 087-3743783.
For BDO: Conor Dempsey, Dempsey Corporate, 0862479892,
conor.dempsey@dempseycorporate.com
Eileen Banks, Press Officer, Enterprise Ireland, 01-7272805, 087-2445814,
eileen.banks@enterprise-ireland.com
Notes for Editors
Development Capital Fund
The Development Capital Scheme was launched in 2012 by Minister Bruton as
part of the Action Plan for Jobs in order to increase the availability of
growth and expansion risk capital in the form of equity or quasi equity for
established Irish manufacturing and high growth companies. The main
objectives of the Scheme are to:
•Increase the availability of risk capital to established Irish
companies
•To close the equity gap experienced by Irish SMEs
•To encourage and leverage private sector investment in the Irish
economy
Through an open and competitive process, Enterprise Ireland has made
commitments of €75m available to three funds. Under the Scheme, commitments
were made to funds that will provide equity, quasi equity or debt of
between €2m and €10m to established investee companies. This is the second
fund announced under the Scheme.
About the BDO Development Capital Fund & Development Capital Limited
The BDO Development Capital Fund is a €75 million Fund aimed at investing
development and growth capital in established, mid-sized and profitable
companies to support and accelerate their export growth plans. The fund is
managed by Development Capital, a 100% subsidiary of BDO.
BDO is Ireland’s longest running BES/EIIS Fund Manager and in conjunction
with its joint venture partner Davy, have successfully raised and managed
19 BES Funds and 3 EII Scheme Funds over the past 20 years. This amounts
to over €136 million.
Development Capital has created a unique and unprecedented smart funding
model centred on a partnership approach that, in addition to substantial
capital, will give the selected companies access to advice and
international contacts from a range of large Irish corporate and senior
business executives. The corporate partners to the fund include Bank of
Ireland, CRH plc, Glanbia plc and Glen Dimplex. The fund will be invested,
over a period of three years, in approximately 15 companies. Each
investment will invest between €2million and €10million for an investment
term of five years.
BDO Smart Funding Model and Advisory Board
Led by Investment Directors Sinead Heaney and Andrew Bourg, the team at
Development Capital have developed a unique Smart Funding Model for the BDO
Development Capital Fund that combines capital with access to, both
corporate and executive experience as well as international contacts. The
fund capital sources include Enterprise Ireland, Bank of Ireland, CRH plc,
Glanbia plc and Glen Dimplex.
This unique
approach combines to create a broad and deep bank of
international business experience for investee companies to draw upon. In
addition to the Corporate Partners who have committed both funding and
expertise to assist investee companies, the investee companies have access
to proven industry experts who have created, grown and developed Irish
Companies into international success stories comprising: Denis Brosnan
(former CEO of Kerry Foods), Alan Crosbie (Former Chairman Irish Examiner
and family business expert), Dr. Noel Kelly (former Executive Director of
Kentz), Dr Jim Mountjoy (founder of Euristix) and Helen Ryan (former CEO
Creganna Tactx Medical). The Development Capital Investment Directors are
supported by an Investment Committee chaired by Eoin O’Driscoll (Chairman
of SWS).
Partner Quotations
Bank of Ireland
Commenting Mark Cunningham, Director, Bank of Ireland Business Banking
said: “Bank of Ireland is delighted to be supporting the BDO Development
Capital Fund. The fund's particular combination of support from corporate
Ireland and its strategic objective of facilitating the growth ambitions of
indigenous, export-orientated SMEs across a broad range of sectors, has
obvious appeal to Bank of Ireland. As a bank, we are committed to the
recovery and sustained growth of the SME sector (approving € 4 billion in
new and increased lending in 2013). Our support for this fund is a further
demonstration of the Bank's continued commitment to SMEs and our ambition
to be Ireland's Enterprise Bank. We look forward to playing our role
alongside BDO, Enterprise Ireland and our new corporate partners”.
CRH
Speaking on behalf of CRH, Dr Jack Golden, Organisation Development
Director, said: “We believe this initiative will help to accelerate the
growth of some very high quality small and medium sized businesses as they
tackle global markets. Our experience over the last 40 years has shown that
establishing a position abroad is as much dependent on developing networks
as it is on accessing capital and we have always been very happy to help
Irish companies entering the markets in which we operate.”
Glanbia
Siobhan Talbot, Glanbia Group Managing Director, said: “Glanbia is very
happy to support this BDO Development Capital Fund and to help indigenous,
export-orientated SMEs achieve balanced growth and in so doing drive
exports and support the domestic economy. Across the Group, we are
involved in a number of local and international projects that seek to make
a tangible difference in local communities where we operate and we look
forward to working with BDO, Enterprise Ireland and the other corporates on
this initiative”.
Glen Dimplex:
Glen Dimplex’s Seán O’Driscoll said: “Glen Dimplex, which started out as an
indigenous Irish business, has demonstrated through scaling how a business
can be internationalised from an Irish base. When the opportunity to
support the BDO Development Capital Fund was presented to us, Glen Dimplex
immediately committed to investing as a demonstration of its support for
scaling and the internationalisation of Irish businesses and of its
commitment to assisting Ireland’s economic recovery”.
Glen Dimplex was founded in 1973 and is the world's largest manufacturer of
electrical heating, and also holds significant global market positions in
domestic appliances, cooling, ventilation, and renewable energy solutions.
Today Glen Dimplex is leading the way with the low carbon revolution, with
an unrivalled range of solutions in space and water heating, cooling,
ventilation and heat recovery. Across the world these innovative low carbon
systems enable its customers to reduce CO2 emissions and eliminate cost.