Vy Capital, a Dubai-based investment firm that mostly invests in start-ups and private companies, was founded by a former associate of Russian billionaire Yuri Milner in March 2013. Alexander Tamas was partner at Mr. Milner’s Digital Sky Technologies from 2008 to 2013, after having previously worked as an investment banker at Goldman Sachs.
Mr. Tamas was responsible for the international expansion of DST and led investment rounds into companies such as Facebook Inc. (NASDAQ:FB), Zynga Inc. (NASDAQ:ZNGA), Groupon Inc. (NASDAQ:GRPN), and other well-known tech companies. Mr. Tamas subsequently left Mr. Milner’s firm to launch his own firm, named for an aviation term referring to the best speed of climb. Although Vy Capital primarily operates as a private equity firm, the Dubai-based asset manager also invests in a handful of publicly-traded tech companies. Mr. Tamas’ Vy Capital recently filed its quarterly 13F for the June quarter, so let’s have a look at the firm’s equity portfolio and its major moves during the quarter.
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Vy Capital Sells Out of LinkedIn Corp (NYSE:LNKD) Stake
– Shares Owned by Vy Capital (as of June 30): 0
– Value of Vy Capital’s Holding (as of June 30): 0
Vy Capital sold off its 265,000-share stake in LinkedIn Corp (NYSE:LNKD) during the April-to-June quarter, which makes us believe that the Dubai-based investment firm decided to take some chips off the table. Given that LinkedIn shares should have little movement between now and the closure of its merger, the position made the perfect candidate to take off the table. In mid-June, Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) inked a deal to acquire the professional social networking company for $26.2 billion in cash or $196 for each LinkedIn share. The Board of Directors of both companies have unanimously approved the multi-billion-dollar deal, which is anticipated to close by the end of the current calendar year without facing any regulatory hurdles.
LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman recently said that the world’s leading professional social network decided to sell itself to Microsoft because it was becoming too hard to compete with the world’s biggest tech companies, especially when it came to research and development into new technologies. Microsoft anticipates the deal will deliver $150 million of cost synergies annually by 2018. Alex Snow’s Lansdowne Partners owned 1.27 million shares of LinkedIn Corp (NYSE:LNKD) at the end of the March quarter.
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The next page of this article will discuss the remaining three equity holdings in Vy Capital’s portfolio at the end of the June quarter.
