Although it may seem that the global economic situation is stabilizing and that inflation is easing, the business world still feels the ‘tails’ of the recent peak of the crisis in its operations, and the war in Ukraine continues.
We are in full swing preparing for the largest Lider conference, Day of Big Plans, which is being held for the 15th consecutive year, and this year it will take place on September 27 at the Westin Hotel in Zagreb.
This year, we expect leaders from various industries in Croatia, representatives of the public sector and state institutions on stage, from whom we will learn firsthand what awaits the entrepreneurial scene and the Croatian economy as a whole in 2024, how all economic stakeholders are facing existing challenges and preparing for upcoming ones, and what their forecasts and predictions for the next year are.
The representative of the investment market will be Igor Čičak, partner and CEO of Provectus Capital Partners fund. In his opinion, the challenges for private equity fund investments are similar to economic challenges in general, and next year there will be high uncertainty regarding the further rise in the cost of money, i.e., the limit to which the European Central Bank will raise interest rates. Such decisions directly affect investments from funds, as well as the value of the investments themselves. He mentioned inflation, which is still not under control, as another uncertainty.
– The decline in the inflation rate in the US is good news; however, the US and Europe are in a different situation, in Europe interest rates and inflation are more influenced, among other things, by the global energy market, and the war in Ukraine is still ongoing – says Čičak.
In the recent period, Provectus Capital Partners (PCP) has invested primarily in sectors that have proven resilient to economic cycles, so the largest portion of the fund’s investments is directed towards private healthcare (medical and dental institutions), specialized retail (for example, stores with sports equipment and electric bicycles), and veterinary clinics.
– These sectors have shown solid resilience during the crisis, so we plan to continue investing this year and next, both in the organic growth of our portfolio companies and in acquisitions. We are also looking at other sectors that are growing, fragmented, and scalable, so we are interested, for example, in specialized infrastructure that supports the development of private healthcare and specialized retail, as well as the business services sector, such as outsourcing and insourcing services – explains Čičak.
