We start this blog under unusual conditions. Pandemia, economic recession, unemployment, political uncertainty all over, yet innovation and growth still fuel high value creation.
Great news for Spain’s startup ecosystem came from Idealista confirming its unicorn status. According to a recent note in the Financial Times:
EQT Partners has agreed a €1.3bn deal to buy Idealista, a Madrid-based property classifieds site, as the Swedish private equity group seeks to shift southern Europe’s property market online in the way groups such as Rightmove and Zoopla have in the UK. The deal values Idealista at more than five times the €235m that rival private equity firm Apax, its current owner, valued the company at when it bought a majority stake in 2015. The valuation is 25 times the classifieds group’s €50m in earnings in the year to December 2019, a high multiple compared with most buyouts.
An EQT Partners press release explains:
- Idealista’s underlying market is supported by favorable secular megatrends, such as the increasing shift from offline to online marketing spend, as well as significant network effects driven by the platform’s strong brand recognition.
- EQT will, together with Idealista’s founders and management team, support Idealista’s continued growth momentum and further penetration of existing markets, by leveraging EQT’s strong digital and sector expertise, “local with locals” approach, and extensive advisory network.
This transaction rewarded Idealista’s value creation strategy through innovation and growth, with a 5x multiplier in five years.
We celebrate this news and congratulate all involved in Idealista’s successful transaction. We take this news as a confirmation of Spain’s creative and increasingly strong innovation-based business development ecosystem and as a great incentive for starting this blog.
For 20 years working out from Caracas, we have witnessed over and over in Latin America and Spain, and have been part of these kinds of business value creation. In our website we have a list of current venture deals we have worked on recently. It’s a sampling of the kind of work we are committed to do for entrepreneurs, investors and business leaders within Spain, Latin America and wherever the Venezuelan diaspora is doing business.
This blog will be written, sometimes in English, other times in Spanish, by our partners and invited experts on topics having to do with startup investing, venture building, corporate venturing, venture capital and private equity.
Our focus is in seed, early-stage startups and high growth business projects. Our experience is mainly in the tech sector, specially applications in education, ecommerce, finance and insurance, healthcare, biotech, food and beverage industry, agribusiness and oil and gas industry engineering services. We work with qualified investors, business angel groups, family offices, institutional investors, corporate venturing and innovation programs seeking to diversify their investment portfolio.
We look forward to having an active and useful role in Spain’s challenging business ecosystem.