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Founder Group to float PE fund

(China Daily/Agencies)
Updated: 2009-10-30 08:10

China's No 2 PC maker, Founder Group, is raising a 2-billion-yuan ($292.89 million) private equity fund with a focus on technology, media and telecom sectors as it seeks new profit streams, sources said yesterday.

It would be Founder Group's first private equity fund. Its bigger PC rival, Legend Holdings, established two investment firms - Legend Capital and Hony Capital - years ago, and the two are now very active players in China's private equity industry.

The fund would be denominated in yuan because major institutional investors, so-called "limited partners" in the private equity fund, include many domestic enterprises, said a person who is familiar with the plans. Founder Group also plans to inject some money, but the amounts were not disclosed.

"Compared with Legend and Hony, Founder's first fund would be pretty small, but it's anyway a landmark move for Founder," said one source.

"Obviously, it comes later but finally it comes, better than never getting one," he said.

Related readings:  PC investors want more earnings surprises  Legend to invest 10b yuan over five years  Lenovo's mainland sales up  More PC companies will court rural consumers

The sources, who have direct knowledge of the plan, declined to be identified because of the private nature of the fund-raising process. Founder Group could not immediately be reached for comment.

Legend and Hony are running several multi-billion-dollar funds, and the two companies have become a stable profit stream to its parent company, which owns Hong Kong-listed Lenovo Group.

In recent years, the government has become more welcoming of private equity funds to support the country's economic growth, thereby creating more local jobs.

Founder Group, which was founded in Beijing in 1986 with a small investment from Peking University, has a Shanghai-listed arm, Founder Technologies.

Founder Group is also a local partner of Credit Suisse, and the two have already launched an investment banking joint venture, based in Beijing.