Forbes Magazine Names Fastlane Ventures among Ten Most Successful Venture Investors in Russia
24 October, 2013, Moscow
Forbes Magazine named Marina Treshchova, General Director and Co-Founder of investment company Fastlane Ventures among top ten Russian venture investors.
Russian Forbes magazine calculated this rating similarly to The Midas List – rating of world’s largest venture investors calculated by US Forbes magazine. Key parameter of investors’ success under this methodology is the number and size of “exits”, i.e. effectively the size of proceeds received from the sale of the stakes in portfolio companies.
Fastlane Ventures sold online shoe retailer Sapato to Ozon.ru and TV-shop Shopping Live to German company Home Shopping Europe in 2012. Currently Fastlane Ventures manages more than 10 portfolio companies.
Almost all successful projects in this ranking are Internet businesses. “Russia is number one market in Europe [in this area], so now we can be viewed internationally not only as oil and gas producer”, – Forbes notes.
“We are delighted to be recognised as some of the most successful venture investors in Russia, – commented Forbes rating Marina Treshchova. – We are carefully selecting proven business models, creating new businesses from scratch and becoming reliable operational partners for our portfolio companies. At the same time, as first round venture investors, we are thinking of new investment rounds and exit potential from the very beginning. This strategy had proven its efficiency since the foundation of Fastlane Ventures three years ago, and already started bearing fruit”.
“Rating composition clearly indicates the prospects of Russian e-commerce market. Russian-speaking Internet community is already the largest and one of the most dynamically growing in Europe. Fastlane Ventures continues to focus its expertise on portfolio companies development in the best interests of its stakeholders”, – Marina Treshchova added.
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Fastlane Ventures was created in 2010 by a team of serial entrepreneurs with extensive and extremely profitable investment experience in Russia and CIS countries. Among the many successful projects of our founders, there is Ozone, KupiVip, Otto Group in Russia, Rusfinance Bank, Linzmaster and others. Currently, the total amount of investment involving Fastlane Ventures, and its associated companies, amounts to around 100 million dollars (US).
Our key strategic partners are Direct Group, e.ventures, VTB Capital and Kenes Rakishev. Also, Russian and international investors include Intel Capital, Kinnevik, ru-Net, UMJ Russia, Prostor Capital, Runa Capital, Paradigm Investments, Russia Partners and others.
Full text of Forbes ranking is available (in Russian only) at http://www.forbes.ru/reitingi-photogallery/246564-venchurnye-kapitalisty