Headed by former Wind and Vimpelcom execs, Digital World Capital (DWC)--a new London-based hedge fund, has received $75 million of seed funding from Egyptian billionaire Naguib Sawiris to acquire underperforming telcos in Europe.
Some of Europe's largest institutional fund management groups have been approached by DWC to invest in the private equity fund, with the aim of acquiring holdings in smaller telecoms groups struggling in the tough economic conditions in Europe, or that are being touted for sale by larger heavily indebted operators.
According to The Financial Times, the fund will be managed by Accelero Capital, which is part-owned by Sawiris, and managed by execs that worked with him on the turnaround of the Italian telecoms group Wind, which was sold with other assets owned by Sawiris's Weather investment vehicle to Vimpelcom for $6.5 billion in 2011.
The firm is expected to look for other 'anchor' investors after attracting the initial backing of Sawiris, although the bulk of the capital will come from institutional investors, according to one person with knowledge of the process, as reported the Financial Times.
For more:
- see this Financial Times article
- see this HFM Week article
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