Verdane exceeds target for second Edda fund; closes on €540m

The fund exceeded its target of €450m by €90m and was "significantly oversubscribed", the GP said. It committed a significant amount of its own capital to the fund but did not disclose the figure.

The GP started fundraising in April 2020, and raised the fund virtually. It held a first close in June, and an interim close before announcing the final close today. Partner Frida Einarson told Unquote: "We were seeing a lot of interesting deals during the summer so it was important for us to have a fund raised and ready to deploy, so we held a first close in June."

She described the process as "surprisingly smooth", and that its investors "were amazing at switching to fully virtual meetings and conducting DD that way". She added: "I think we'll take some good learnings from this. Of course, nothing can replace meetings in person and we'll definitely still be doing that, but I think for LPs virtual meetings can be very efficient, particularly if you know the manager." 

Edda II will be a 10-year fund and is larger than its predecessor, which held a final close on €297m in March 2018. It made 10 platform investments and will not be used to make further platform investments.

Rede Partners and Andulf Advokat advised the GP on the fundraise.

Investors
Of the 40 LPs committed to Edda II, 90% of their committed capital came from existing investors across Europe, North America and the Middle East, and 30% of the total capital from Nordic investors.

LPs in the fund include universities, foundations, insurance companies, family offices, government agencies, and private and public pension funds.

More than half of the fund's committed capital came from non-profit sources.

Investments
The fund will follow the same strategy as the previous Edda fund, and will make minority and majority investments of €10-150m in 12-15 growth businesses across northern Europe.

It will continue to focus on companies in digital consumer, software, and energy and resource efficiency, all of which have been positively impacted during the pandemic. Einarson said: "Looking at the digital consumer, obviously the trend has very much accelerated, and the same goes for software businesses. Simultaneously, interest in how we can live sustainably and tackle climate change has jumped, meaning that all three mega-trends we back have been given a growth push during the pandemic. So, the strategy will not change. If anything, this experience has made us more convinced."

The GP has already made two initial investments, namely Hornetsecurity, a European provider of cloud-based email security and data protection, in September 2020; and Stratsys, a cloud-based strategic planning platform, in November 2020.

Verdane currently manages nine funds, holding approximately €3bn in total commitments, and has made 120 investments since 2003.

The GP has recently promoted two new partners: Frida Einarson was head of IR and business development and Janne Holmia was principal. It also expanded its Berlin and Stockholm investment teams with the appointments of Maximilian Kempken as director and Paula Ruiz Azcue as associate, respectively.

People
Verdane – Henrik Aspen, Frida Einarson (partners).

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