RESEARCH IN ITALY - Ice

1.2. Private equity and venture capital investmentsItaly is still experiencing a significant lack of venture capital activity and the industry is rather immaturecompared to the other European countries. However, venture capital in Italy is starting to grow.OECD estimates of 2007 showed that available venture capital funds in Italy were equivalent to 0.031%of GDP. The percentage has improved in the last year since in 2008 OECD estimates have recorded avalue of 0.067% of GDP 6 . The OECD Science Technology & Industry Scoreboard of 2007 ranked Italy inthe 17 th position in terms of availability of venture capital funds as a percentage of the GDP and in 2008,there has been an improvement from the 17 th to the 12 th position.Although the size of the market in absolute value is rather small, the years 2006, 2007 and 2008 haveregistered the highest values over the past five years. According to the Italian Private Equity and VentureCapital Association (AIFI)’s statistics 7 , the effects of the international financial crisis have reached theItalian private equity and venture capital market that, after hitting record levels in 2008, the first half of2009 saw a decrease in activity. Between January and June 2009, the market recorded 155 new deals,for a total value of 1.069 million Euros. The decrease in the number of deals was significant but limitedto 9%.Specifically, AIFI reports that in the first semester 2009, 27% of the total amount invested went totransactions in the high technologysector. It is interesting to observethat compared to the previousyears the number of investmentsin the high tech sector significantlyincreased while the amountinvested registered only a slightincrease. This data suggest thatthere is the lack of so-called megadeals (over 300 million euros) inthe first half the year.Figure 1: Investments distribution inhigh tech companies6 Sources: OECD Science Technology and Industry Scoreboard 2007 & 2008, in Rapporto Innovazione di Sistema 2007 & 2008. FondazioneRosselli and Corriere della Sera7 AIFI statistics: The Italian Private Equity and Venture Capital market in the first semester 2009Italian Trade Commission - New York20096