Odysseus Investments, the venture capital and private equity arm of Reech Corporations Group and Seed Founders, a technology investment company established by InsureTech investor Minh QTran, are joining forces to create an new framework which will allow investors to achieve scale exposure to a range of traditional, alternative and tech venture capital assets.
The firm writes that Odysseus Alternative Ventures combines Reech Group’s strengths in real estate, alternative assets and technology with Seed Founders’ expertise in incubating innovative start-ups in insurTech, propTech and disruptive finance generally.
The new firm plans to bring an innovative approach to managing alternative assets allowing funds to invest at scale in both underlying asset classes and related Tech start-ups. It is targeting EUR1 billion of AUM within five years.
Odysseus Alternative Ventures will be majority owned by Reech Corporations Group via Odysseus Investments with Seed Founders owning the remainder. The firm writes that it has been structured to appeal to managers of both family wealth and institutional funds who are looking for the ability to invest at scale in both real and alternative assets, while gaining meaningful exposure to the potential of start-ups seeking to disrupt traditional players in those same sectors.
Odysseus Investments and Seed Founders recently established PropTech Capital, the first dedicated European fund to invest in technology companies that positively impact the property environment, either through business model or product innovation.
Minh Q Tran, Founding Partner of Seed Founders, has a strong reputation in Insurtech investing, with a particular focus on early stage startups. He has also founded Insurtech Capital, a dedicated special purpose vehicle for (Re)insurance companies investing in startups. He is the founder of AXA Seed Factory and served as General Partner at AXA Strategic Ventures. Minh Tran also sits on the Boards of a number of Insurtech and PropTech start-ups. Minh Tran will be Managing Partner and CEO of Odysseus Alternative Ventures, with Christophe Reech (pictured) as Chairman of the new Company.
The firm writes that Odysseus is contributing its experience in creating and nurturing businesses in the financial and technology sectors, as well as the entrepreneurial, capital markets and real estate expertise of the wider Reech Corporations Group. This is the latest in a series of initiatives as Odysseus seeks to build a unique position as a scale player in alternative assets and disruptive finance and technology.
As part of the transaction, Odysseus will inject its current portfolio of five early-stage fintech investments into the new joint venture, while Seed Founders will contribute its existing InsureTech and WealthTech assets.
The new structure will be based in Luxembourg, with operating bases in London, Paris, Zurich and Luxembourg, and will consist of a family of specialist venture capital funds investing alongside a parallel series of funds focusing on the relevant underlying assets. OAV will start life with an existing porfolio of investee companies which it aims to rapidly augment with the new opportunities that will open up once the networks of the two founders are successfully combined.
Minh Q Tran, founder of Seed Founders says: ”OAV is responding to a real need of investors for a framework that enables them to access the opportunities presented by the explosion of disruptive innovation in a meaningful way. We are convinced that we can deliver superior returns to investors by giving them access to niche alternative funds in exciting new sectors not covered by traditional firms such as finTech, propTech, asset and wealth Tech, insureTech alongside the relevant underlying asset classes in a form which allows them to deploy substantial funds without diluting returns or losing focus.”
Christophe Reech, chairman of Reech Corporations Group says: ”The new venture will enable us to take advantage of the breadth of experience that we have within the wider Reech group in managing both real and alternative assets and the synergies that come from understanding how new technologies can be applied to the underlying sectors and asset classes. We believe that the new structure will enable us to meet effectively the needs of managers of large pools of capital who want to access the combined expertise of the group in order to gain exposure in both early state ventures and alternative assets. This is a structure designed to appeal to family offices, pension funds, endowments and wealth managers generally.”
