"Recently, I have often brushed up on Middle Eastern funds to recruit people." Wu Yu broke the silence.
He works for a US dollar fund in Shanghai, but has not invested in a single project this year, "it can be said that there is no income". A sense of crisis hit, and he had to start focusing on new opportunities.
This is perhaps the situation of most USD fund partners. "Investors in the circle got together to chat, and the topic was turned to the Middle East." Wu Yu has discussed the opportunities of Middle East funds with his friends in US dollar funds more than once——
"We really want to think about forming a 're-employment group' and meeting Riyadh."
Whenever we talk about Middle East fund recruitment, everyone invariably opens up the conversation. A VC friend in Beijing revealed that since the beginning of the year, she has been systematically combing through the offices of Middle Eastern funds in China, "looking for opportunities to establish contacts." ”
Latest scene:
Middle East fund recruitment is quietly on fire
Joyce is a headhunter who specializes in serving the VC/PE circle, and she found that many Middle Eastern funds have been active this year, adding a lot of HC, and "some positions have to be assigned".
Not long ago, Joyce had an in-depth conversation with a candidate who came out of the US dollar PE, "The other party feels that instead of cutting his salary and going to the yuan, he has to adapt to another discourse system, and it is better to be prepared to look for opportunities in Middle East funds." ”
Quietly, everyone has set their eyes on the Middle East sovereign wealth funds that are intensively opening offices in China, but it is difficult to find a seat. The most sensational is Mubadala Investment Company, which held the opening ceremony of its Beijing office a month ago, and so far has a Chinese team of less than 10 people, and only 2 Chinese faces.
Opportunities are hard to come by. Many people revealed that in March this year, when 42X Fund set up an office in Shanghai, it had "picked it up" a person from a leading US dollar PE in China.
An investor who has been following the Middle East for a long time shared on social platforms that the sovereign funds that currently recruit nationals mainly include the Saudi Public Investment Fund (PIF), Abu Dhabi Twin Star Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA) and Mubadala Investment Company, Dubai Investment Company (ICD), Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), etc.
The unified feature of the layout of these institutions in China is that they are biased towards financial investment to do asset allocation, so there are not many personnel allocated locally in China, and most of them need to be based in the Middle East.
The investment community understands a relatively accurate recruitment demand:
The Saudi Public Investment Fund is currently looking for investment professionals and plans to recruit more investment experts and advisors in the coming years;
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority is recruiting for Investment Managers and Senior Analysts, and the Qatar Investment Authority has likewise released investment manager positions... More and more Middle Eastern funds are expanding their investment teams.
In addition, local state-owned enterprises in the Middle East have also become a popular choice - "mainly recruit Chinese people who travel between China and the Middle East all year round, take charge of some investment matters, or research China's industrial leaders to see what investment opportunities there are." "These are similar to industrial investments, which take on the heavy responsibility of industrial transformation in Middle Eastern countries.
"I originally wanted to see fundraising opportunities, but in fact, it is difficult to engage with local tyrants in the Middle East, and many bigwigs have not gotten much money when they go." A VC investor based in Shanghai revealed that this year, by chance, I got a job offer to go to the Middle East, "My little forgotten Arabic came in handy again." ”
"The end of the dollar fund, the rise of the oil fund"
The change and migration of investors is the most symbolic manifestation of the ups and downs of the venture capital industry.
We are witnessing history. Over the past two decades or so, US dollar funds have been the clearest pioneers, who have traveled far and wide across the ocean and continued to bet on becoming the biggest winner of China's Internet wave.
It was a time when the stars were shining. When RMB funds buried themselves in the study of the non-sexy manufacturing industry and even experienced the cold winter of RMB fundraising, US dollar funds staged a scene of investment myths. During that period, US dollar funds not only invested generously, but also paid investors several times more than their RMB counterparts.
But it all faded away. In 2019, the Science and Technology Innovation Board debuted, hard technology set off a wave of IPOs, RMB funds ushered in a long-lost lively scene, and the Internet era that US dollar funds are good at came to an end.
To this day, the survival of US dollar funds is in full swing. When hard technology became the most certain theme of the times, the dollar fund had to fully change the rudder, but it had no choice but to fall into the embarrassing situation of "not understanding and not being able to invest". Combined with the changes in the general environment for IPOs in the United States, the exit has been blocked, and the fundraising has become even worse.
In the past two years, the discomfort of first-line investors in US dollar funds has become more and more intense. "Investors have started to ask for work", "Investors have started to travel on business trips"... If you are also following the venture capital circle, similar topics shared on social platforms must be uncommon.
In addition to tying investors who used to go from place to place, more and more investment institutions have begun to control fees and require them not to travel unless necessary, and many institutions, including many first-tier US dollar funds, have become more and more stringent.
A friend of the US dollar fund sighed, "Now you must fill out a detailed application for business trips, and only those that are clear and reliable will be approved, and if you can take the high-speed rail, you will not take a plane, and you must minimize the number of business trips." The standard of business trips has also been lowered a lot, and where can I stay in Shanghai during the summer vacation? This remark resonated with many investors.
Subsequently, there were topics in the circle about salary cuts and staff reductions in US dollar funds, and a VC partner once told the investment community: "The well-known US dollar funds you have heard of are all cutting salaries. ”
In this situation, US dollar fund investors are scattered everywhere. Someone decided to change careers and join a startup that they had previously invested in; Some people are non-stop interviews and consider accepting a salary cut to go to a state-owned institution; Some people continue to stay behind, "if there is a job, take it first"; Of course, there are also people who are ready to try the opportunity to pan for gold in the Middle East -
"You have to admit that the dollar fund is over, and the oil fund is still rising."
The Middle East is hot, sweeping the primary and secondary markets
This year, we were impressed by the Middle East consortium.
The latest scene is from October 8th to October 14th, the Shenzhen Venture Capital Association organized a business trip to the Middle East. Liu Day, founding partner and chairman of Dachen Caizhi, and Jiang Yucai, vice president of Shenzhen Venture Capital, led a team of senior executives from well-known local venture capital institutions and invested companies in Shenzhen, focusing on Abu Dhabi and Dubai, two core cities in the United Arab Emirates.
Earlier, Shenzhen Bay welcomed a group of Middle Eastern guests - a delegation from the United Arab Emirates led by Abdullah bin Tuq Al Mali, a member of the UAE cabinet and Minister of Economy, a group of more than 10 people, came to China's local venture capital aircraft carrier Shenzhen Venture Capital for inspection and exchange.
Even more sensational is that in early September, Mubadala Investment Company held a ceremony for the opening of its Beijing office. As the third largest sovereign wealth fund in the UAE, the direct leader behind Mubadalah is the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi. According to the official website, Mubadala's latest management scale exceeds 276 billion US dollars, or about 2,000 billion yuan.
Of course, the most shocking scene is the explosion of local tyrants in the Middle East - the data shows that in the 2023 semi-annual reports of A-share listed companies, sovereign wealth funds have appeared among the top ten circulating shareholders of 89 companies, including Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, Kuwait Investment Authority and other Middle Eastern forces; In just over a month, Saudi Aramco, the world's largest oil company, has invested more than 100 billion yuan in China.
At the same time, more and more familiar corporate names have appeared behind the figures of Middle Eastern consortiums, such as ByteDance, SHEIN, Jingdong Industry, Hero Sports... It is worth mentioning that Middle Eastern consortia are intensively investing in China's new energy vehicles - NIO, BeyonCa (Bentry), Qiantu Auto, Geely and so on. Recently, Pony.ai also announced that it has received a $100 million financing from an investment fund under New Future City in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
For a long time, Middle Eastern countries have relied on abundant oil and gas resources, which can be called rich and flowing. Although it is a gift from nature, it is inevitable that there will be worries about the future survival: what will happen if the oil runs out? Therefore, the economic diversification and transformation of Middle Eastern countries is imminent, and when the Middle East consortium, which represents the will of the government, turns its attention to the world, China is an important stop.
As is widely believed, "Chinese companies have the capacity and technology that the Middle East needs today, and the Middle East, with its wealth accumulation over the past few decades, can provide the market and capital that Chinese companies need." ”
Since the beginning of this year, fundraising in the Middle East has become the standard configuration of domestic VC/PE. Especially when the mainstream US dollar LPs as a whole have a wait-and-see attitude, a large number of US dollar fund partner-level leaders have flown to the Middle East.
Coincidentally, at the end of October, Kangqiao Medical and Health Industry Facilities Platform announced that its first China Life Science Industry Facilities Fund had successfully completed the second round of closing, raising a total of US$875 million. The main investor of the second round of fundraising is Mubadala Investment Company.
As far as the eye can see, conglomerates from the Middle East are stirring up a pool of spring water. Perhaps looking back in a few years, this will be a new historical opportunity.
(Wu Yu is a pseudonym)