ArieGuard launched the first digital platform for M&A advisory and venture capital fundraising that connects business owners, investors, and investment bankers all over the world via an Uber-like interface. ArieGuard provides all the necessary digital tools and services to process transactions and make deals more efficiently.
ArieGuard was funded by the founders, and by angel investor Dmitry Zubatyuk, a serial entrepreneur, who has founded several successful global IT startups and invested in multiple technology projects. The total amount of initial investment in ArieGuard is $1.2 million.
ArieGuard is focused on the market for small M&A and fundraising deals with a size of $5-50 million and underserved industries such as early-stage tech startups and cannabis. This category of deals is not attractive for bulge bracket banks, and such deals end up being referred to small investment boutiques with a limited network and experience.
The total global market size of this type of deals is about $190 billion. ArieGuard is aiming for the M&A advisory fee market which has an estimated value of over US$10 billion.
“The M&A and investment industry is operating in the same way as when it was invented decades ago. It’s a conservative field which is very old-fashioned,” observed Vlad Seleznev, a co-founder of ArieGuard. “When a business owner comes to an investment bank, their opportunities are limited by the list of contacts that the investment banker has in his or her little paper notebook. This approach drastically narrows the network of investors who are informed about the investment opportunity. We want to change this situation and build a global network of trusted partners (investment bankers) and investors, so that when a business owner is seeking funding or has an M&A opportunity, they could find the best deals.”
ArieGuard implemented a system of ratings and connections that allows all three parties to choose who to work with and be sure that they are trustworthy, even if a person is out of their personal network.
“ArieGuard brings the M&A and investment banking industry into the current digital era,” said Dmitry Zubatyuk, a serial entrepreneur and pre-seed investor in ArieGuard. “Currently, investment bankers do a lot of ‘monkey jobs’ trying to attract clients that are not really interested. They are working 80-100 hours a week on deals that are not likely to close. ArieGuard is shifting the industry to the gig economy and deals made via video calls, so that investment bankers are able to work remotely, and even be freelancers, choose deals and clients and have transparency in how much they’re going to make.”
By the end of 2022, ArieGuard plans to attract 5 percent of about 100,000 M&A advisors globally. Also, the team is developing an AI tool for the automated valuation of companies and an intelligent search system that will help investors quickly and easily look up projects from all over the world by multiple parameters.
ArieGuard is the first global Digital Investment Banking Platform that connects business owners, investors, and the best investment banking professionals. The company also provides all the necessary digital tools, including an AI-based automatic valuation system, online data rooms, mobile app, and many others. This enables these players to close M&A and fundraising deals in a far more efficient way.
