Programma 101, the Milan-based brand venture capital firm focused on early-stage investments in the Italian digital space, has held its first close, as reported by Reuters, at €32 million.
As anticipated back this June subscribers includes Azimut SGR and Fondo Italiano di investimento (FII), which made a €15M investment each in the first fund launched and by serial entrepreneur and VC Andrea Di Camillo, dedicated to investments in the digital space.
Programma 101, which has a fund raising target of €50 million, intends to invest among and €500k and €1.5M in high-tech startup companies. With a past as "business angel" and venture capitalist (has worked together with Elserino Piol in Kiwi), Andrea Di Camillo has built a network of incubators and under his wing there are already potential interesting companies for the fund.
Tannico (online wine e-commerce store) and Cortilia (online agri-market) are the most renown names among the companies followed by Di Camillo. Overall, the network has incubated more than 100 companies with "various development phases". Investment opportunities are identified thanks to the strategic partnerships signed by P101 with leading italian accelerators such as, H-Farm, Nana Bianca, Bizmatica, Boox, Club Italia Investimenti 2, I3P, JesiCube, Polihub, Startmiup, SiamoSoci, AIFI.
Programma 101 aims to make 15-18 investments. For the final closing, the manager of P101 aims to involve other institutional investors and Italian entrepreneurs, especially those in the digital space. What characterizes the Italian venture capital, says Di Camillo, is "a very industrial approach." The liquidity is scarce, incomparable to that found in the United States. But now the situation is quite different than the bubble of 2000. "Now there are true companies, that make turnover, not just ideas," he concludes.