Growth fund in Aruba a fact

March 02, 2012 6:34 AM

ORANJESTAD – Aruba Growth Fund (AGF) is a fact . Thus, the idea and desire of initiators Milton Berlinski, Rene Kan, and Justus Martens of early 2011 to set up a local investment fund with 100 million florins has become a reality.

The capital of the Aruba Growth Fund will be invested in share capital, so not in loans, of Aruban companies in the next seven years.

Five prominent local investors – general pension fund APFA, the pension funds of utility companies WEB and ELMAR, the private group of companies Meta Corporation, and CMB bank (subsidiary of MCB) – have hereby joined as investors in this new investment fund, to be managed by Berlinski, Kan, and Martens, together with two principals, by the name of BKM Management. AIB (Aruban Investment Bank) has been involved in the fundraising for the fund from the beginning, and will continue to assist in attracting new investors in the next two years. “These are existing, medium-sized and large companies in all sectors of the economy with the potential to grow further by (regional) expansion, diversification, and investments. The companies must have a good track record and a strong management team.”

Trust in companies
According to the initiators, at the moment it is very difficult for good Aruban companies to attract new capital and for the owners of these companies to sell their shares. “Growth capital is not available at this time, and family businesses do not find solutions to their succession problems.” If there are interested investors to begin with, they are often foreign and consequently less inclined to observe the local interests – employment, continuity, business culture – according to Berlinski, Kan, and Martens. “The Aruba Growth Fund will see to it that as in many other countries there is now an investment instrument with which local (institutional) investors participate in the capital of local companies.

Motors Growth Fund
Milton Berlinski, Rene Kan, and Justus Martens decided in early 2011 to set up a local investment fund of 100 million florins so that they could use their broad international experience as entrepreneurs, investors, and financial specialists to invest in Aruban companies and to strengthen the Aruban economy. “In most countries local companies have access to (growth) capital through the share market and private equity funds. These capital resources so important to economic development have so far been completely absent in Aruba. The arrival of a local investment fund is consequently crucial to the growth of the local economy,” according to the initiators of Aruba Growth Fund (AGF). Yesterday at 3 p.m. the necessary documents for the official establishment hereof were signed.

29 February 2012

Sabine Altena, attorney at law at VanEps Kunneman VanDoorne, assisted Rene Kan, Justus Martens and Milton Berlinski with the set-up of Aruba Growth Fund C.V.

VanEps Kunneman VanDoorne was involved in the entire process: advising on the structure, developing the fund agreement and related documents such as the subscription agreements for the investors and admitting the initial institutional investors to the fund.

(www.ekvandoorne.com)