It is operational from today, has a final collection target of 80 million euros and has already started the scouting of Italian digital startups for the first investments to be made, with particular attention to the regions of Southern Italy. These are the main credentials of Primo Digital, the new “seed to early stage” venture capital fund promoted by Primo Ventures and managed by Antonio Concolino, Gianluca Dettori, Franco Gonella and Niccolò Sanarico. The prerogatives of the new vehicle also include the fact that it is a native ESG (Environmental, social and governance) fund in all activities concerning the investment process, support and monitoring of its subsidiaries. In other words, the sustainability criteria will be taken into consideration when carrying out the financing operations, favoring the opportunities that present the characteristics to achieve objectives in line with these criteria in addition to pure financial returns.
Banca Sella is also among the investors
The fund, as stated in the press release issued by the company, starts with an initial endowment of 62 million euros and includes two parallel funds fully subscribed by Cdp Venture Capital: the first, Parallel Italia, systematically co-invests in companies with operational headquarters in the Peninsula, the second, Parallel Italia Sud, is instead focused on new tech companies born in the South. The institutional investors who supported the project also included Tinexta and Banca Sella Holding, as well as some angel investors and Primo Ventures itself.
The objectives
Primo Digital’s goal, as the spokespersons confirm, is to create and develop a portfolio of around 25 companies within the next ten years, ranging from software to blockchain. Four, in detail, the main investment areas defined: B2B-class applications able to scale internationally by improving the competitiveness of companies or by enabling new business models, solutions for the retail world and digital marketplaces, cybersecurity technologies and innovative services in the fintech, insurtech, regtech and proptech fields.
Beyond the early stage
After the various Cortilia, Yolo, Sardex, Iubenda, Vivaticket and Viamente, the Primo Digital team, as explained by Gianluca Dettori (President of Primo Ventures and Partner of the new fund), wants to give continuity to early stage operations and more precisely to continue to ” invest in the initial phase in entrepreneurial teams that have the potential to create companies with a strong technological component and to make them scalable and competitive “, with almost double equipment of the previous Barcamper Ventures vehicle and therefore with the possibility of investing significant resources in subsequent rounds . A significant part of the fund, in fact, will be reserved for follow-ons aimed at accelerating the growth of the companies in the portfolio.