Oana Coșman
The new fund will invest exclusively in early-stage technology startups, continuing the thesis of the first Early Game fund. It will focus on areas such as cyber security, enterprise software, and AI applications.
The funds from which EGV II will invest come from institutional partners and private individuals who also invested in the first EGV fund, as well as from new investors. The fund benefits from an investment of 30 million euros from the Recovery Equity Fund, managed by the European Investment Fund and financed by the National Plan for Recovery and Resilience within the Next Generation EU. The final approval for this investment was received less than two months ago, at the end of February 2024, with the management team managing to launch the new fund in record time.
The new fund's target size is 60 million euros, and the Early Game team is already preparing for the final closing.
"We are grateful to all the investors who believed in us and chose to join us in continuing our mission to find and invest in the best tech startups in Romania and CEE. It is an important confirmation of our work that, in a difficult economic context, we managed to attract the necessary private financing and that, in a very short time, we will sign the final closing at the size of 60 million euros. Not many managers can boast of oversubscribed VC funds during this period. We also thank all Fund I investors who have supported us since 2018 in this process. We are convinced that, in the next 5 years, we will be able to identify and accelerate the development of the region's most promising technological companies, " says Cristian Munteanu, Managing Partner EGV.
"We are looking for founders who live in the future, and we focus our efforts on giving them fuel to achieve their goals. Fuel means not only money but also networking, support, guidance to avoid mistakes, asking the right questions, finding clients, and raising the next round of investments. I'm sure we will find them," said Dan Călugăreanu, EGV Partner.
"We are particularly happy that we will be able to support more young entrepreneurs who aspire to build businesses on a global scale starting from Romania. Especially since we can do this with Romanian capital and capital attracted to Romania. We are also adding a regional component to the new fund, managing to attract private capital from outside the country that we want to use by investing in startups in the region."
Cristian Munteanu is among the very few VCs in the region with experience as a founder of tech startups in Romania and Silicon Valley.
Along with Cristian Munteanu, the partner team of EGV II is completed by Dan Călugăreanu and Florin Visa.
Dan Călugăreanu, Partner in the first EGV fund, continues his activity as a professional investor in both funds managed by Early Game. Before becoming a Partner at Early Game, Dan Călugăreanu was the Chairman of Tech Angels, but also an angel investor.
Florin Vișa, having 24 years of experience in private equity investments, venture capital, M&A, and corporate finance in Central and Eastern Europe, joined EGV with the start of negotiations for this second fund.
In recent months, the EGV II team has been running an intensive campaign to identify young technology companies with potential, and will soon announce the first investments from this new fund.
Recently, the Early Game team also announced a new exit from EGV Fund I, the American PDQ software asset management company acquiring CODA Intelligence, a company specialized in cybersecurity solutions and one of Early Game's first investments.
