Pitango

Pitango Venture Capital, established in 1993, is Israel's largest venture capital fund with over $1.8 billion under management. Pitango is focused on seed, expansion and late stage companies in core technologies, consumer, and Life Sciences. The firm's investors include Time Warner, Citigroup, Eastman Kodak, Deutsche Bank and HarbourVest Partners.[1]

Pitango Venture Capital
TypePrivate
IndustryVenture capital
Founded1993 (1993)
FounderRami Kalish
Headquarters
Herzliya
,
Israel
AUMUSD 1.800 million
Number of employees
~30
Websitewww.pitango.com

History

The fund was founded as Polaris Venture Capital in 1993 by Rami Kalish, as part of a government initiative named the Yozma program ("Initiative" in Hebrew); which offered attractive tax incentives to any foreign venture-capital investments in Israel and offered to double any investment with funds from the government.[2]

In 1996, Kalish was joined by Chemi Peres, son of former Israeli president Shimon Peres, to create Polaris Fund II, which raised more than $100 million. Polaris II invested in 35 high-tech companies. Some were partially funded by another Israeli VC firm, Eucalyptus Ventures. When the investments proved successful, Polaris II and Eucalyptus merged into Fund III in early 2000.[1]

In 2000, Rami Beracha, who joined Pitango in 1996, became a managing general partner. He resigned in 2018.

In 2001, Polaris Venture Capital changed its name to Pitango Venture Capital, to avoid confusion with Boston based Polaris Venture Partners. Although the Boston firm was founded in 1996, which was after Pitango was founded, the Israeli firm decided to change its name. Pitango takes its name from the semi-wild Surinam Cherry that grows in Israel.[3]

Pitango Venture Capital Fund IV followed in 2004, and in 2007, Pitango V.

In 2010, with the support of the Israeli government, Pitango established the first fund in the country focused on investment in the Arab-Israeli sector, called Al-Bawader (Arabic for “early signs”).[4]

Notable companies

Exits
Company Industry Description Initial Investment Date Exit
Anobit Semiconductors flash memory controllers 2006 Acquired by Apple Inc. in 2012 for a reported $390 million.[7]
InstallFree Software Application virtualization technology 2006 In December 2012, WatchDox Acquired InstallFree.[8]
ClearForest Software Brokerage compliance, anti-money laundering, and fraud prevention 2001 Acquired by Reuters in 2007 for $25 Million[9]
Radcom Ltd Communications Networking Infrastructure Equipment 1993 IPO on NASDAQ in 1997
Boxee Consumer electronics 2007 Acquired by Samsung Electronics in 2013 for $30 million[10]
Check, Inc. Mobile Mobile Applications 2007 Acquired by Intuit in 2014 for $360 million.[11]
AeroScout Industrial Communications RFID 2000 Acquired by Stanley Black & Decker in 2012.[12]
BioLineRx Biotechnology 2003 IPO on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange.[13][14]
dbMotion Software Health technology interoperability 2005 Acquired by Allscripts in 2013 for $235 million.[15]
Mainsoft Software Network virtualization for software testing 1993
VocalTec Telecommunication VocalTec released the first Voice over Internet Protocol application 1993 IPO on NASDAQ 1996
Red Bend Software Software Mobile software management 2000 Acquired by Harman International Industries in 2015.[16]
Radware Communications Advertising Data 1997 IPO on NASDAQ 1999
Traiana Software Post-trade processing, client servicing, and trading partner integration for financial institutions 2004 Acquired by ICAP in 2007 for $247 million.[17]

References
  1. Chemi Peres: ‘Startups are not for pessimists’, Ruthie Blum; ISRAEL21c, October 8, 2013
  2. Gilder, George, "Silicon Israel — How market capitalism saved the Jewish state", City Journal -Summer 2009, 19 (3), retrieved 2009-11-11
  3. Israel's Polaris changes name to avoid confusion with Polaris Ventures; Boston Business Journal, Jul 11, 2001
  4. The Startups of Nazareth, Drake Bennett, Bloomberg Businessweek, November 26, 2014
  5. "Graphcore Secures Lead in Global AI Chip Race With $200 Million in New Capital From BMW, Microsoft and Leading Financial Investors". wallstreet-online. Retrieved 2019-09-12.
  6. "Pitango Venture Capital". crunchbase. Retrieved 2019-09-12.
  7. Solomon, Shoshanna; Ferziger, Jonathan; Barden, Andrew J.; Maedler, Claudia (January 12, 2012). "Apple Said to Acquire Israel's Anobit Technologies for About $390 Million". Bloomberg. Retrieved February 5, 2012.
  8. http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20121211005838/en/WatchDox-Acquires-InstallFree-Provide-Secure-Document-Viewing
  9. Eric Auchard (30 April 2007). "Reuters to acquire text search firm ClearForest". Retrieved September 1, 2010.
  10. Chen, Brian X. (3 July 2013). "Samsung Electronics Acquires Boxee, a Video Start-Up". The New York Times.
  11. "Intuit agreed to purchase Check for $360 million". The Wall Street Journal.
  12. "AeroScout, Stanley and Black & Decker Complete Merger" (Press release). AeroScout Industrial. June 5, 2012. Archived from the original on June 9, 2012. Retrieved June 5, 2012.
  13. Cohen, Omri (7 February 2007). "Biotech comes of age: Bioline floats at half-billion shekel market cap". TheMarker. Retrieved 28 November 2011. Bioline Therapeutics today pulled off its initial public offering in Tel Aviv, raising NIS 211 million at a company valuation of NIS 494 million, making this the biggest flotation by a biotechnology company in local history.
  14. Rheinheimer, Laura (8 February 2007). "BioLineRx raises $50m. in TASE's largest biomedical IPO". Jerusalem Post. Retrieved 28 November 2011. BioLineRx Ltd. on Wednesday priced the largest ever initial public offering of a biomedical company on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange, raising a total of NIS 211 million, or $50m.
  15. Allscripts Healthcare Solutions is acquiring Israeli healthcare software provider dbMotion for $235 million, Reuters, Mar 5, 2013
  16. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2016-03-04. Retrieved 2016-09-13.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  17. "ICAP acquires Israeli post-trade software firm Traiana". ITPro. 11 Oct 2007.
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