Italy VC & IPO Newsletter

АААААААААААААААААААААITALY V.C. & I.P.O.NEWSLETTER, Sep. 26, 2000 АААААААААААААААААА

Companies seeking capital - Italian Finance News Digest (VC deals,IPOs,Internet,TLC, UMTS,Nuovo Mercato) - Profile of the week: TISCALI SPA - Internet JOBS - Conferences

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EMAIL-FRIENDLY format - FULL VERSION (.zip & .pdf) from http://www.help-finance.com

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------------------------ITALIAN ECONOMY & FINANCE NEWS DIGEST-----------------------

VENTURE CAPITAL

-WEBEGG , an Olivetti-Telecom Italia web consulting & web integration J-V , acquired 35% of Domino, a Torino-based web design e web architecture company, for approximately Euro 1.9 million.

-PINO VENTURES continues build-up of regional TLC operators in Italy with the launch of two new ventures: TIBERCOM (Center Italy) and TRINACOM (Sicily) . The total number of Pino Ventures-backed regional TLC start-ups now stands at 9 . Tibercom will offer fixed telephony to business & residential clients in center Italy with a target of 40k business and 300k residential subscribers by 2004.
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NUOVO MERCATO

-IPO of the week: None
-Impending IPOs: (full IPO pipeline schedule - request it via email)

--DATAMAT, b2b company, filed for an IPO. Half-year revenues up 26,7% , at E 60 million circa, and pre-tax earnings at E 2.2 million circa.

--DATASERVICE, ISP & online banking company, received OK for IPO. The offering date is set for Oct. 6th-8th. Global coordinator & bookrunner are Interbanca and Intermonte Securities.

-VETERANS
-- A week decidedly negative with oil , Euro, recession fears and Intel all conjuring to create a moody situation in the market.
---MILANO Blue Chip Index : - 3.5% while
---MILANO NUOVO MERCATO INDEX: - 3.8% points.
---Four notable exceptions to this general trend: Inferentia, Mondo TV, TC Sistema and Euphon.
----INFERENTIA started the week on a rampage (half-year revenues up nearly 300%) and closed on Friday at E 85.73, a 12% gain in one week!
---- MONDO-TV skyrocketed too on news of an agreement with Korean Hahn Shin Corporation for co-producing cartoon series La Turandot.
---- TC SISTEMA and EUPHON also gained respectable ground on positive analyst recommendations.
-- The rest of the pack got clobbered, with the worse beating on ONBANCA, OPENGATE, FREEDOMLAND, and e-BISCOM which bled over 10% of its stock value.
---- e-BISCOM announced acquisition of 80% German TLC company HanseNet from parent Hamburgische Electricitates, a Hamburg utility company, for nearly E 240 million.
---- TISCALI lost 5% (UBS-Warburg ISP downgrade), announced bid for Freenet.de (owned by Mobilcom) obtained confirmation of its bid for WOL.

NUOVO MERCATO INDEX - FRIDAY 22, 2000:-3.8% (all closing prices in FULL VERSION)

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INTERNET

- INTERNET COMPANIES
-- KATAWEB issued shares for E150 million to bank Unicredit in anticipation of an IPO. Kataweb is controlled by CIR, one of the industrial holdings of the De Benedetti Group which comprises other Internet plays, like Cirlab, an Incubator, and CDB Web Tech , a corporate VC company. The Unicredit deal, in addition to money, values KATAWEB at E 3 billion!
-- JUMPY, the Internet portal belonging to Fininvest Group, announced a postponement of its IPO due to market turbulence, but confirmed intention to IPO by year-end
-- DNM, an Internet solutions company announced 2 acquisitions in anticipation of its IPO: Cfp Communication (70%) and Greek Artaxia (51%). The company closed its first half with a 211% jump in revenues .
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TELECOMMUNICATIONS (TLC)

- UMTS: approved by govmt committee technical & commercial plans of all bidders
- TELECOM ITALIA: TI Wireline Services launched WebPhone, ISDN service to Internet without a PC.

- SEAT: valued Matrix, the media & Internet ratings company E 2.5 billion; announced stock option plan for 3% pf capital to founding shareholders - SEAT is acquiring from minority shareholder De Agostini the balance of shares to 100%.
--INFOSTRADA SALE: valued by Albacom (British Telecom and Fininvest) at E 9 billion and complained of higher bidding from state monopolist ENEL. ENEL replied that the bid is from its wireless TLC operator Wind.
ERICSSON closed two high-profile alliances with: Magneti-Marelli, to develop systems and solutions for use of Internet in the automobile industry -- with Edisontel, a TLC operator to apply Engine technology for high-speed UMTS networks.
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BIOTECH-PHARMA

- SHARDDNA , a genomics company launched by Tiscali' patron SORU,to identify disease causing genes in the close nit population of Sardinia, the island where Soru is from, and where Tiscali was launched. Soru is putting up E 4 million in start-up funding for 75% of the company.

-------------------------------PROFILE OF THE WEEK---------------------------------

TISCALI SPA

Tiscali SpA, based in Cagliari (Sardinia), was launched in 1998 by Renato Soru to take advantage of the liberalization of the TLC sector in Italy. The company, backed by Elserino Piol, TLC guru & senior partner of VC firm Pino Ventures, had overnight success with pre-paid telephone cards, a novelty in Italy. The company has been aggressively pursuing a high-growth strategy by internal development and acquisitions. In addition to pre-paid cards, pre-paid Internet access first and then free Internet, broad-band infrastructure through Nets S.A, its infrastructure subsidiary, and expansion in other European countries were also other stragegy pieces in tireless Soru's ICT puzzle. In just two years the company has become a leading contender to AOL in ISP services in most European countries. Soru has added in the past year two additional strategic assets to its war chest: an IPO in 1999, which provides him with paper value to exchange for other paper in the battle for acquisitions; and Andala, the UMTS consortium founded by Tiscali and run by Soru, whose control was recently sold to Hutchinson-Whampoa, with Tiscali retaining 25%.

Tiscali reported second quarter sales of E 30.07 million, nearly the same amount of all 1999 sales and 23 times sales in 1998. On Friday 22, Tiscali closed at E 42.00 , - 5.2% vs. previous week and + 162% vs. IPO. Tiscali is currently trading at 1.4x sales (as of Q200 results) , lower than most TLC competitors .

SHAREHOLDERS: Renato Soru: 64.7% --Kiwi Ltd, a fund advised by Pino Ventures:7.5% -- Market:27.8%
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OPEN VC DEALS (Abstracts & ExecSums available in FULL VERSION & WEB SITE

-(0120) HFH (Russian Technology Incubator & Search Engine - ITA - 2А Round
-(0118) AIM (Internet ASP, B2B Software-Russia & USA - 2А Round
-(0117) EIA (Internet Portal, Arts & Entertainment - USA - 2А Round
-(0116) DHP (TV, Animation, Multimedia - U.S.A.- Start-up funding)
-(0112) ODT (Internet & Health-ITA- Start-up Funding)
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INTERNET JOBS

-Hot jobs in Italy: Leading Intranet Company seeks 5 Developers (HTML, DHTML, ASP, Visual basic, VBA) - Milan
-Cool Jobs: IT infrastructure jobs & consultancies:listing on web site
- Service Jobs: Call center & Telemarketing : listing on web site at www.help-finance.com
For more info send an email to hclub@help-finance.com, writing JOBS in the subject.
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CONFERENCES & SYMPOSIUMS (15% discount to help-finance.com subscribers)

-International Business Forum conferences: USA
-- Early Stage Investing - Oct. 23/25 - Renaissance H. - S. Francisco, CA
-HiTechNews conferences - Moscow

--StartVenture - Investing in Russian Technology and Internet - November 30 - Holiday Inn Moscow Vinogradovo

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