Private Equity Russia

The Belarus government is preparing a project at the order of the president which will lead to the creation of a state venture company.  As proposed, the fund will initially be controlled by the State innovation fund.

“We studied several mechanisms for supporting venture financing at a state level”, said Anatoly Grishanovich.  ”It was decided, as an experiment, to transfer responsibility for this to the State Innovation Fund, as it has experience working with these kinds of projects.”

The fund would be similar in function to the Russian Venture Fund and the Belarussian government will be coordinating with its counterparts in Russia and Kazakhstan in setting up and operating the new fund.

The first Belarussian Venture Fair will be held in Minsk in November at which the activities of the new fund will be spelled out in detail and introduced to the public.

[Via Unova]

In the second half of 2010 The, Russian Venture Company will open a private equity fund for Infrastructure Innovation with committed capital of 2 billion rubles (approximately $67 million), according to Yan Ryazantsev, RVC’s Investment Director.

By innovation infrastructure, Ryazantsev told Interfax-Sibir, is meant the complete complex of services that support innovation and the needs of start-up companies.

Ordinarily, The Russian Venture Company works either through appointed management companies on a fund level, or manages and supplies funding entirely through its own resources.  In this fund, according to Ryazantsev, government and private funds will be jointly employed on a project level.