Leopard Capital Wins “Frontier Markets Investment Manager of the Year” Award in Acquisition International’s 2013 M&A Awards

Leopard Capital - Press Release | May 30, 2013



Leopard Capital LP has been named “Frontier Markets Investment Manager of the Year” in Acquisition International’s 2013 M&A Awards.
The firm also won three additional awards in this year’s competition: “Private Equity House of the Year – Cambodia” for the second consecutive year, “Fund of the Year – Cambodia”, and “Boutique Private Equity House of the Year – Haiti”.

The annual Acquisition International M&A Awards recognize the leading professionals in the tax, start-up advisory, hedge fund, private equity, venture capital, and real estate industries. A record number of votes were received in 2013 and winners were determined based on the total number of votes and in-house research. Acquisition International is the definitive magazine for venture capital, corporate finance advisers, and top tier management and it provides complete international coverage of M&A transactions, combined with industry expertise and sector analysis.

dloHaiti Taps VC Funding as it Brings Haiti Clean Water and Jobs

The Wall Street Journal | May 14, 2013

By Lora Kolodny

A “for-profit, for-good” startup, dloHaiti, raised $3.4 million in Series A funding to bring clean, affordable water and new jobs to communities across Haiti, according to the company’s chief executive and founder, Jim Chu.

Investors in dloHaiti’s Series A round included firms that focus on social ventures: LeopardCapital, IFC InfraVentures (an investment arm of the World Bank Group) and Netherlands Development Finance (FMO), along with Miyamoto International.

Pronounced like the French word for water (“de l’eau”), dloHaiti sets up solar-powered kiosks that purify water on-site. It also hires teams to distribute the water to nearby communities. The kiosks are made from off-the-shelf components, Chu said, and are optimized to treat Haiti’s abundant supply of groundwater.

While Haiti is still rebuilding critical infrastructure after a catastrophic earthquake in 2010, it experienced drastic water poverty, especially in rural areas, many years prior, the CEO said. In Haiti, the lowest price for treated water is 12 cents per gallon, about eighty times higher than the lowest price in the U.S., according to research by dloHaiti.

Frontier Hurdles

Global Trading | May 15, 2013


Leopard Capital Fund Manager, Thomas Hugger of Leopard Asia Frontier Fund and Managing Partner of Leopard Capital LP, goes through some of the major difficulties faced in various frontier markets in Asia.

In the frontier markets, even though you have electronic data services such as the internet, social media, and Bloomberg, it is very difficult to get financial papers or balance sheet papers, and other fundamental papers for some of the companies in these locations. Even if you go to Bloomberg and search on Bangladesh, you don’t have the balance sheet there. If you go into Bloomberg and look at Mongolian stocks, you will often find the price, but the description says, “The company currently has no available information on their current line of business as of 08/2008”. These are often blue-chip companies, and sometimes we have visited them or we have networks there, but there is limited information available.

But this is frequently because business is based on a more personal note, and I would say physical representation gives a big advantage. Our strategy on the private equity side complements this, so everywhere we have firms, we have offices. So we have an office in Cambodia, we have an office in Laos, we have an office in Haiti. When we are successful in fundraising for Myanmar and Bangladesh, we will have offices there too.

For private individuals it is still very difficult to invest in these markets. Go to a private bank in Hong Kong or Singapore, tell them you want to buy stock in Laos or even Vietnam and they will often tell you “Oh we are sorry, we cannot execute”.

Leopard Cambodia Fund exits mineral water producer Kulara

AltAssets | May 07, 2013

Emerging markets firm Leopard Capital has successfully exited its entire investment in Cambodian mineral water company Kulara Water to the company’s founding shareholder.

The transaction harvested an undisclosed profit for Leopard Cambodia Fund, the firm said. It provided Kulara with venture financing and operational support, enabling Kulara to complete its factory construction and refine its business plan.

Richard Intrator, CIO of Leopard Cambodia Fund, said, “Leopard Capital is proud to have helped create another world-class consumer product and local brand in Cambodia. Kulara’s factory is now fully operational, and eau Kulen is poised to become a significant player in the local water market. Having supported Kulara from a concept to a successful launch, we have now returned ownership to its founder and will redeploy the sales proceeds into other promising businesses.”

Leopard Cambodia Fund was launched by Leopard Capital in April 2008 as the first private equity fund for Cambodia. It raised $34m and has since made 14 investments in Cambodia, Thailand, and Laos, including CamGSM, ACLEDA Bank, IPR, Kingdom Breweries, Tropical Beverage Co, Kulara Water, Phnom Penh Water Supply Authority, Greenside Holdings, EDL Genco and Engage.

Leopard Capital was founded in 2007 by Douglas Clayton and manages two other funds: Leopard Haiti Fund, and Leopard Asia Frontier Fund.