Thanks to attractive macro fundamentals, SE Asia’s fast-growing economies, Vietnam in particular, are increasingly grabbing the interest of global private equity powerhouses.
“Now people don’t call Vietnam a frontier market anymore,” Conrad Tsang, chairman & co-founder, Strategic Year Holdings Limited, said during the Vietnam-focused panel discussion at the Asia PE-VC Summit 2021.
What is driving the shift in investment approach is the quick adoption of tech seen in Vietnam.
Strategic Year has invested in Vietnamese education startup TEKY Holdings. The firm is spending more resources and time in markets like Vietnam, Indonesia, Cambodia, the Philippines, and in cross-border opportunities.
Speaking on the theme, Quang Pham, who oversees Vietnam as well as other SE Asia markets for Crescent Group Capital Management (Crescent Point), said, however, the shift by larger PE firms looking for opportunities in smaller deals ($20-25 million) in Vietnam has created more “competition.”
Crescent Point had invested $36.2 million in Vietnam’s integrated children’s lifestyle platform N Kid Corporation in 2019.