Does a Venture Capital Market Exist in the Countries of Former Yugoslavia?

Abstract

<p>Venture capital investments spread all over the world during the last few decades. Until then, they were considered only as an American phenomenon. Countries worldwide are interested in attracting venture capital investments because of their undisputable effects on the economy. The effects of the investments are visible through the impact on innovation, creation of new companies, jobs, economic growth, corporate governance and etc.</p><p>Venture capital is a subset of Private equity focused on start-up companies and companies having difficulties in attracting necessary capital. It represents an equity investment made for the launch, early development, or expansion of a business.</p><p>The countries of former Yugoslavia (Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia - FYROM, Montenegro, Slovenia and Serbia) are part of the Central and Eastern Europe countries and represent relatively a new market for venture capitalists. They moved from the planned economies to a free market system in the 90s of 20 century. As well as other countries in the World, these countries are also interested in attracting venture capital because of the proven impact on economic growth. Despite the presence of Venture capital and Private equity funds in this region for more than twenty years, the venture capital and private equity market in the countries of former Yugoslavia is underdeveloped compared to other countries of CEE. Indeed, the venture capital investments are so small for some countries of former Yugoslavia that the data about venture capital investment are published jointly.</p><p> </p><p>The objective of this paper is to examine and analyze the development of Venture Capital market in countries o former Yugoslavia. The research is both qualitative and quantitative, and involves an identification, analysis and comparison of PE/VC investments data for selected countries. The time frame for this research is between 2007 and 2014. The total volume of venture capital investments per year, the number of companies invested and the ratio of PE investments to the gross domestic product (GDP) will be used to demonstrate the existence of the venture capital market in countries of former Yugoslavia. The data necessary for the current research were taken from the yearbook of EVCA/PEREP Analytics for 2014 for Baltics and Ex-Y. „PEREP Analytics” is a centralized, non-commercial pan-European private equity database. The „PEREP Analytics” statistics platform monitors the development of private equity and venture capital in 25 European countries.</p>