Capital Expansió commits €1m to Aïta

The GP committed €1m to the round, with remaining contributions from three private investors.

As part of the deal, Christian Garcia Valle, an executive at clothing company Mango, will head up Aïta and assume its presidency. The founding family fully exited the business as part of the funding round.

The company will use the fresh funding to double the number of stores it operates over the next four years, with a particular focus on international expansion. Aïta also intends to grow its turnover from €8.5m to €23m across the same period.

The new shareholders join existing backer Finaves in the firm's capital structure. Finaves, the investment arm of IESE Business School, backed the firm in 2007 via Finaves III.

Launched in 2012, Capital Expansió is a €20m vehicle dedicated to Catalan companies in the technology and industrial sectors with a turnover of €10-100m. The Institut Català de Finances has so far provided all of the existing commitments to the fund, which is managed by ICF Capital. The vehicle remains open to institutional investors with a hard-cap of €50m.

Company
Founded in 2000 and based in Barcelona, Aïta designs, manufactures and retails accessories for women. The form operates in Spain and internationally, including Latin America and the Middle East, where it has stores in Kuwait, Qatar and Bahrain. Turnover currently stands at €8.5m.

People
Javier Relats is one of the founders of Aïta and the company's former managing director.

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• Topics
• Southern Europe
• Consumer
• Expansion
• Spain