Last week at the Startup Village open-air conference, the Skolkovo Foundation announced the launch of Skolkovo Ventures, a group of three new investment funds devoted to IT, industrial technology and biotech.
The funds, which have been set up in partnership with the state-backed fund of funds RVC, will operate out of an office in the Skolkovo tech park on the outskirts of Moscow. They will be headed by Vasily Belov, who formerly served as the Foundation’s senior vice president for innovations.
“As you know, in the last two years, the volume of investment on the venture market has decreased by 2.5 times in dollar terms,” said Belov, explaining the reasons for setting up a commercial venture fund. “Yes, you can say that in ruble terms, the volume remains about the same, but the venture business is global, so, unfortunately, that argument doesn’t stick here. As a [state institution] that supports a large number of startups, we see a deficit of money, and in particular, money that would allow companies to grow and enter foreign markets,” he said.
The new funds will focus on helping companies go global and attract foreign investment, he added.
Venture partnerships for startup internationalization
Belov revealed that each of the three funds has 2.2 billion rubles in capital (some $39 million at the current exchange rate), with RVC being the investor with 1.5 billion injected for each fund.
Skolkovo’s investment department is being integrated into Skolkovo Ventures, said Sakovich. Skolkovo Ventures has inked partnerships with three existing private venture funds specializing in each of its focus areas: iTechCapital (in IT), I2BF (industry) and Primer (biomed).
The IT fund will invest in startups working in areas including artificial intelligence, cybersecurity and Big Data. The industrial fund will focus on the Internet of Things, robotics, AI, energy and space, while the biomed fund would look primarily for companies that have already reached phase I and II clinical trials, according to representatives of the three partnering funds.
Skolkovo Ventures will support Skolkovo’s resident startups, but up to 30% of its capital can be invested in other startups with international ambitions, said Alexander Korchevsky, a partner at I2BF.
Source: Skolkovo Foundation
