June 7 (SeeNews) - Bulgaria’s Vitosha Venture Partners is working to identify further potential targets across 20 most promising companies doing business in the country, in order to share out the remainder of its 26 million euro ($27.9 million) investment capital amongst them, a partner at the venture firm told SeeNews on Wednesday.
"We are very opportunistic in terms of industries and this results in a very diversified exposure. Saying that, there are some verticals that are naturally attractive to venture capital and it’s not a coincidence we have and seek more startups in these fields: B2B SaaS, fintech, cyber security, e-commerce, AI," partner Stoyan Nedin told SeeNews by email as Vitosha Venture Partners announced new investments in nine start-ups that are based in or have operations in Bulgaria.
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According to Nedin, the venture fund has wrapped up over 60 deals and is in the process of closing many more, which it will announce in the upcoming months.
"Our market is relatively limited, we can’t afford to pick just a few verticals as there wouldn’t be enough promising startups in them," Nedin explained. He added: "We will explore even further the potential of spurring and supporting innovation in the automotive industry of Bulgaria as it contributes to our GDP with 5 billion euro ($5.35 billion), involving around 70 thousand people, some of whom might be interested in transitioning from outsourcing to innovation and entrepreneurship."
The startups which Vitosha Venture Partners backed in its latest transaction are Bulgarian National Auction Company, trading as Nakantara, an online car and property auction platform; France-based online events space and supplier marketplace Native Spaces; Canada-headquartered e-commerce consumer data analytics platform Chathalla; Bulgarian tin-lead and lead-free alloys producer SN Metals; and individual investor-focused fintech platform Finqup.
Capital injections were also made into four startups from the fund's accelerator programme -- online platform for issuing education diplomas and certificates Diploma Id, online pet-sitters platform Petstay, wood panel modular houses provider Nomad Cabins, and Twisted Technology, an online platform connecting users with technical services.
Vitosha Venture Partners typically invests amounts in the range of 25,000 to 1,000,000 euro in early-stage and growth-stage Bulgaria-related companies from various industries. Its investment strategy and mandate open the way for providing capital, in part financed by EU funds, to more than 100 startups or scale-ups.
($ = 0.9333 euro)