The Lithuanian asset manager INVL Asset Management completed a first closing of its 10-year INVL Baltic Sea Growth Fund, a closed-end private equity fund intended for professional investors, at €106mn, the company announced on February 8. 

Following the closing, the INVL Baltic Sea Growth Fund became the largest private equity investment fund in the Baltic countries, INVL Asset Management said.

The fund is aiming at creating a portfolio of 8-12 investments, each between €10mn and €30mn in value unless carried out with co-investors in which case investments could be bigger. 

The investments will be in “medium-size companies with an attractive risk-return profile, providing them with capital for further growth,” INVL Asset Management said. 

The fund will focus on controlling or significant minority stakes and will play an active role in the management of target companies, aiming to significantly increase their value over the long term.

At €10mn-€30mn, investments will be bigger than transactions that private equity players in the Baltic countries typically undertake but off the radar of the largest international private equity and strategic investors.

The fund’s anchor investor is the European Investment Fund (EIF), part of the European Investment Bank (EIB), which has committed to invest €30mn, backed by the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI), the main plank of the Investment Plan for Europe, also known as the Juncker Plan.

The EIF is, in turn, committing resources from the Baltic Innovation Fund, a fund-of-funds launched by Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia in order to boost equity investments in Baltic small and medium businesses with high growth potential.