HA NOI (Biz Hub) — A Mizuho Bank (Mizuho) fund that assists Japanese companies interested in expanding in Southeast Asia has made its first investments, a total sum of $32 million, according to asia.nikkei.com.

It also emphasised that although many Japanese banks had set up investment funds, most of their activities were usually domestic and those that invested in Asian businesses overseas were rare.

Earlier, Mizuho Financial Group said on its website that the objective of the fund was to assist the expansion of Japanese firms, particularly small- and medium-sized enterprises, into the Association of the Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) region. The bank proposes to do that by investing in local companies, with the aim of promoting alliances between Japanese and local firms.

Thus, Mizuho set up its $180 million ASEAN PE Fund in the past year, with the Japan Bank for International Cooperation as an investor. The fund was managed from its unit in Singapore.

The asia.nikkei.com said the fund recently invested $16.7 million to acquire a 14.9 per cent stake in an Indonesian restaurant operator, which plans to open a new chain through a franchise arrangement with Royal Holdings, a Japanese operator of tempura rice bowl restaurants.

The second project was in the Philippines, where the fund will invest $15 million in a biomass project that is promoted by a local power company. Viet Nam will be the third recipient of investment from the fund some time in February.

The asia.nikkei.com stated that the Mizuho fund's strategy is to invest in smaller companies overlooked by the big funds and to provide Japanese businesses with the means to advance into the Asian markets by acquiring stakes in local firms and not just lend them money.— VNS