Invest-NL, a Dutch national financing and development institution, announced that it is looking to launch a new fund-in-fund initiative aimed at supporting scale-ups with pension funds, together with pension funds.
The CEO of Invest-NL, Rinke Zonneveld, announced the plans on LinkedIn to establish a fund with a target size ranging from €600M to €1B, which could be called – Dutch Impact Growth Fund.
The announcement comes as Brabantse Ontwikkelings Maatschappij (BOM) and PME pensioenfonds organised a dinner for pension funds, other investors, and representatives of various organisations.
The attendees included Techleap’s Constantijn Van Oranje-Nassau, the European Investment Bank (EIB)’s Robert de Groot, the European Investment Fund (EIF)’s Bjorn Tremmerie and Peter Coveliers, the Ministry of Economic Affairs’ Tjerk Opmeer, the Nederlandse Vereniging van Participatiemaatschappijen (NVP)’s Tjarda Molenaar and Juul Vaandrager-van Aert, as well as local administrators such as Jeroen Dijsselbloem, Martijn van Gruijthuijsen, and Stijn Steenbakkers.
“For Invest-NL, the dinner was a great opportunity to take a step forward. Over the past year, together with colleagues such as Jellie Banga, Mark Oud, Remco van Montfoort, and Myrthe van Dalen, I have had many conversations with pension funds, administrators, asset managers, and many others. To get a better sense of how it could work for them. More scale and less volatility were for their two central points. And more impact, because that is increasingly playing a leading role for the various pension funds,” says Zonneveld.
This fund will strengthen impact funds that support innovative scale-ups in their growth into fully-fledged companies.
During the LEVEL UP event in Eindhoven, Rinke Zonneveld announced that Invest-NL is prepared to partially hedge return risks through guarantees, potentially through a fund-in-fund vehicle that is yet to be set up.
The announcement comes as a response to the reluctance of many pension funds to use their assets as venture capital for startups and scale-ups.
Consequently, by creating a fund-in-fund, institutional capital can be made available for funds that support young, impact-driven technology companies with venture capital, contributing to a stronger investment climate for innovation in the Netherlands.
“With this, we want to jointly invest in Dutch venture capital funds so that they can finance the upscaling of our promising technological start-ups and scale-ups,” says Zonneveld.
“We want to stick our necks out for this by co-investing in the fund and making it more attractive for pension funds to join. We are happy to take the next step! For a more sustainable and innovative Netherlands,” he adds.
