Stonebridge Ventures targets Korea IPO
Stonebridge Ventures, a Korean venture capital firm with more than KRW700 billion ($595 million) in assets under management, has filed to list on KOSDAQ.
The GP was established in 2017 when Stonebridge Capital converted its venture capital fund operation into a separate entity. The parent was founded in 2008 by Dean Kim, who led a spinout from IMM Investment. Stonebridge Ventures is led by Sung Woon Yu, who joined the firm in 2019, having previously worked at Kakao Ventures and SoftBank Ventures Asia.
Stonebridge Ventures claimed last year that its four most recently liquidated funds generated an average multiple of 3x and an average IRR of 20%. These include the 2010 KIF-Stonebridge IT Venture Fund, which had a corpus of KRW33.7 billion and returned a 3x multiple and a 25% gross IRR, and the Stonebridge New Growth Fund, a KRW29.4 billion vehicle that delivered 2.2x and a 20% gross IRR.
Stonebridge Capital has launched 10 funds in the past three years, according to AVCJ Research. Among them are the KRW26.5 billion Smart Korea Naver-Stonebridge Rising Fund, the KRW10 billion Stonebridge 2020 Venture Fund, the KRW108 billion Stonebridge DNA Innovation Venture Fund, the KRW2.1 billion Stonebridge Lifestyle Venture Fund No. 1, and the KRW6.8 billion Stonebridge Rising Star Venture Fund No.1.
Several of the firm’s portfolio companies have been involved in landmark transactions in the past year, with game developer Krafton completing a $3.8 billion IPO and fashion marketplace Zigzag being sold to Kakao Corporation. Meanwhile, food delivery business Woowa Brothers, in which Stonebridge was an early investor, was acquired by Delivery Hero for $4 billion.
An audit filing for Stonebridge Ventures states that, as of year-end 2020, the firm had KRW21.8 billion invested in early-stage funds and KRW2.2 billion in private equity funds. Total assets were KRW48.7 billion. Revenue for 2020 was KRW24.5 billion, up from KRW18.9 billion the previous year, while net profit rose from KRW6.8 billion to KRW12.8 billion.
The IPO filing indicates that the firm will sell 4.5 million shares but gives no details on pricing.
Korea Economic Daily reported that Stonebridge Ventures and Capstone Partners will both pursue domestic offerings this year.
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