Innova divests PolCard shares

"The development of PolCard within the last two years outpaced our expectations, which is partly due to the dynamically increasing number of non-cash payments in Poland," said Krzysztof Kulig, a partner in Innova Capital. "Because of that we took the decision to sell part of our shares, which will ensure an earlier return on our investors' capital with the internal rate of return reaching 60 percent."

Innova now holds 25 percent of PolCard's shares and doesn't intend to sell them in the near future. "The standard duration of this type of investment is three to five years and we only bought PolCard shares in May 2003, so we won't sell the remaining stocks before a year or two," Kulig explained. He also suggested that PolCard might at that time be floated on the Warsaw Stock Exchange.

The buyer of PolCard's shares - American corporation GTech - is now the company's majority shareholder, and owns around 74 percent of its shares overall. The remaining 0.3 percent is held by the Polish Banks Association (ZBP).

Innova Capital has been active on the market since 1994, and has invested over $250 (zł.825) million in 30 companies, including PolCard, Euronet, Town&City and UPC. The overall value of the three investment funds that make up Innova, namely Poland Partners LP, Innova/98 LP, and Innova/3 LP, amounts to some $300 (zł.990) million. The company is now planning to create a fourth fund called Innova IV.

"Its main area of operations will be investments in financial institutions but also sectors outsourcing the services of such institutions e.g. companies managing IT networks for companies," revealed Kulig. The first transaction is expected to be concluded within the next three months.