The Infinity Fund announced today that Infinity/CSVC, the joint fund of Infinity, Clal Industries and Investments Ltd. and Infinity’s Chinese partner CSVC, has sold an equity interest in WLCSP to OmniVision as part of a $22 million financing round for WLCSP.
This sale marks the second exit by Infinity in China. The first exit was in 2005, when the Chinese company Johnson Electric purchased 51% of Nano Motion, another Infinity portfolio company that licensed its technology for development and manufacturing in the Chinese market.
WLCSP’s products are based on technology licensed in 2004 from Shellcase, one of Infinity’s Israeli portfolio companies. WLCSP develops and sells wafer-level chip-scale packaging services. It uses advanced technologies, ShellOC and ShellUT, to package chips, primarily image sensors. Tens of millions of chips packaged in this technology are used in cell phones, digital cameras, fax machines, digital scanners, CD/DVD portable units, linear sensors, bar code readers and toys. It took WLCSP only 12 months from establishment to realize profitability.
“Infinity continues to draw strategic investors to its activity in China,” says Infinity Managing Partner Amir Gal-Or. “In the case of WLCSP, we were also able to arrange for subsidized Chinese bank loans, grants for intellectual property and the availability of experienced management. All of these deliverables provided a significant added value.”
The Infinity/CSVC Joint Fund is Infinity’s first fund operating under the Israel-China model and the first on-shore fund ever to be approved by the Chinese government (it has the 00001registration number in China).
Infinity announced on 7 May that it had completed the first closing for its second fund operating under the Israel-China model, the new Infinity Israel-China Fund. Infinity raised $155 million, exceeding the original target of $150 million established in October 2006.
Infinity also reported that it has substantially increased the target of the Infinity Israel-China Fund to$250 million, citing a positive response to the new fund, a strong interest in its novel business model and the number and size of existing investment opportunities.
Infinity, founded by Clal Industries and Investments Ltd. from the IDB group, is one of the leading Israeli-related funds managing more than US$400 million and a portfolio of 45companies. Since June 2005, Infinity has had 13 successful exits. Infinity has a highly experienced international team spanning the globe with offices in Tel-Aviv, New York, and China.
Strategic partners include: The IDB Group, I-CSVC/SIP in China, FBR (Friedman, Billings, Ramsey) and GE Investments.