Kenanga Investors Launches Frontier Fund

Ismitz Matthew De Alwis, Executive Director and Chief Executive Officer of Kenanga Investors Berhad

The Fund aims to invest
primarily in equity securities of global cutting-edge, innovative companies
with long-term sustainable growth potential, are on the cusps of initial public
offerings, and have or will develop products and services that are linked to
technologically-driven innovations.

Kenanga Investors foresees
significant investment possibilities in these growth or late stage ventures,
where their underlying themes are unified in focusing on the Next Generation,
or forward-looking innovations currently shaping the industries of the future,
such as the space economy, the metaverse, healthcare, fintech and
cybersecurity. The fund will allow investors to capture the sustainable value
generation of these companies, which were previously exclusively available to
institutional investors.

Ismitz Matthew De Alwis,
Executive Director and Chief Executive Officer of Kenanga Investors explains
that the firm intends to reshape the existing private equity space in Malaysia
by focusing on addressing the lack of available gateways for investors to
access investment opportunities in prominent, hard-to-reach early start-ups. “Since
2016, emerging digital companies have won over the “old economy” by being among
the top five most valuable corporations. Given the constant development of new
technologies, it is unsurprising that new technology companies are sprouting. We
began this process of bridging the gap between prominent players of the new ‘Big
Tech’ and our investors back in 2019.

“The resulting outcome has
been fulfilling for our investors in many ways; from portfolio diversification
to the exploration of a new investment universe beyond the traditional
investing realm, and so, demand for similar offerings has risen. We are glad to
introduce the Fund to the market where investors who were not able to
participate previously will have an opportunity to do so this time”, he said.

The Fund’s focus on
frontier technological breakthroughs signifies Kenanga Investors’ journey to a sustainable
investing roadmap, “Frontier
tech represents a multitude of opportunities in boosting the development curve
of the future, from utilisation of technologies to reduce carbon emissions, new
medical discoveries to propel patient empowerment to the democratisation of
financial services, the advent of frontier tech will allow for greater societal
benefits and driving sustainable returns.” De Alwis explained.