Beringea, the international venture capital firm and manager of the ProVen VCTs, has sold its stake in Saffron Digital, a developer of video delivery platforms, to the HTC Corporation, a global designer of smartphones. In 2007 Beringea invested GBP1.15m in Saffron Digital through its ProVen VCT & ProVen Growth & Income VCT. The deal values the company at £30m and generated an IRR of 65%, on an investment return of 5.8x, for the two VCTs.
Trevor Hope, Beringea’s Chief Investment Officer, says: “We recognised some years ago the potential of mobile to drive digital media adoption and the great investment opportunity Saffron represented. The success of Saffron demonstrates what a digital media company in the UK can achieve when a dedicated, highly-skilled management team is able to draw on experienced and knowledgeable investment.”
Jamie Kennell, Beringea’s Non-Executive Director at Saffron, adds: “When I first met Shashi (CEO of Saffron Digital) in 2006 it was evident that he had a talented management team who understood the mobile market. Since our original investment both management and the business have gone from strength to strength. We are particularly pleased to sell to HTC, who have been an important relationship for Saffron and demonstrated they have the vision and capability to take the business forward.”
