KfW and French promotional bank Bpifrance invest in international venture capital fund

Frankfurt am Main (ots) -

- First parallel investment for the two national promotional banks
in the field of VC
- French fund Partech Growth focuses on young growth companies in
Europe's digital economy

KfW and French promotional bank Bpifrance are investing together
in the field of venture capital for the first time. At a
Franco-German conference on the digital economy held in Paris on 27
October 2015, representatives of KfW, Bpifrance and the French
venture capital firm Partech signed a corresponding contract. In
accordance with the contract, KfW will invest EUR 25 million from its
new promotional instrument "ERP Venture Capital Fund Investments" in
the venture capital fund Partech Growth FPCI. The fund, which has a
total volume of around EUR 350 million, is mainly financed by private
French investors.

Partech Growth FPCI plans to invest sums of between EUR 10 million
and EUR 50 million in 10 to 15 young, innovative and growth-oriented
digital sector companies in Europe during the next few years. In this
context, Partech will strengthen its Berlin office and significantly
expand its activities on the German market.

CEO of KfW, Dr Ulrich Schröder, stated: "Our investment is part of
a long history of diverse and successful cooperation with other
national promotional banks in Europe. In the spring we already
jointly declared to the European Commission our willingness to expand
our joint activities in order to promote growth in Europe. The
usefulness of our cooperation goes far beyond the provision of
capital. The partners also benefit from easier access to markets and
the other party's specific strengths in relation to certain financing
instruments."

With the "ERP Venture Capital Fund Investments" promotional
instrument, introduced in May 2015, KfW is improving the promotion of
technology-based start-ups and young, innovative companies together
with the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy
(BMWi). The plan is to invest up to EUR 400 million in private equity
funds by 2019. This will enable the leveraging of capital amounting
to around EUR 2 billion for the German VC market.

Contact:
KfW, Palmengartenstr. 5 - 9, 60325 Frankfurt
Kommunikation (KOM), Wolfram Schweickhardt,
Tel. +49 (0)69 7431 1778, Fax: +49 (0)69 7431 3266,
E-Mail: wolfram.schweickhardt@kfw.de, Internet: www.kfw.de