The scaleups that made it, the champions that stayed private: one fund holds them, bought in the secondary market and held while they compound. Units are priced quarterly at net asset value. Liquidity comes in windows, at our discretion.
Europe trains the engineers, builds the machines behind the machines, and has quietly produced a generation of private champions the market has barely priced. We believe the continent is holding something enormous. So we hold shares in its best companies, and we do not let go.
The machines that make every advanced chip come from the Netherlands. The decade's defining medicines come from Copenhagen and Mainz. The models challenging Silicon Valley come from Paris. Europe has been ahead for years. Quietly.
The median company now lists a decade later than it once did. The compounding happens before the ticker exists, behind a door most capital cannot open.
Across the continent, companies of consequence were built while the commentary looked west. They do not advertise. Neither do we.
One holding, held well, beats a hundred made quickly. The index does not trade. It records, admits rarely, and waits.
The best companies do not need our capital. Their earliest believers sometimes need liquidity. We buy what they built: existing shares, from the people who were there first. And we hold it.
Existing shares, acquired from early employees, angels, and funds reaching the end of their lives. The company's plans do not change. Ours never do.
Every position sits in a single evergreen vehicle. No fund life, no fundraising cycle, no clock forcing a sale into a bad year.
Conservative marks from the latest financings and observed secondary pricing. Published each quarter, in writing, with the register.
Partners subscribe at net asset value and hold units of the whole index. Each quarter a window opens: units repurchased at NAV, funded first by those arriving. The register does not move.
The register is the index: the names, their cities, their fields, their weights. It is being assembled now, in the secondary market, quietly. Names are published when positions close, never before. What qualifies a company is fixed:
Europe's finest companies stay private for a decade or more. The people who built the first years, the engineers, angels and first funds, carry paper wealth they cannot use. We buy their shares at a fair, negotiated price. They get liquidity. The index gets ownership. The company keeps building.
A fund of Europe's finest private companies. We acquire existing shares in the secondary market, hold them in a single evergreen vehicle, and publish the register and its net asset value quarterly. Partners hold units of the whole: as the companies compound, the net asset value compounds, and so do the units.
Secondaries only. Existing shares from early employees, angels, and funds at the end of their lives, at negotiated prices, with the company's consent where required. We do not lead rounds, demand board seats, or ask founders to change their plans.
No. Public index funds are passive; private markets do not permit passivity. "Index" describes the discipline, not the method: a published portfolio, held whole, traded almost never. Every admission is a judgment.
At first close: professional and well-informed investors, by subscription, under the terms of the prospectus. Broader access is the ambition; the fine print of European fund law decides the pace. The index is open. Slowly.
One management fee, stated plainly in the prospectus. No performance carry is planned. An index should be the cheapest honest way to hold its companies, and carry rewards selling, which we do not intend to do.
Yes, in quarterly windows, at our discretion. Each quarter the index intends to repurchase up to one-twentieth of itself at net asset value, funded first by incoming subscriptions: a departing partner is, in effect, replaced by an arriving one, and the register does not move. You realise your gain at NAV, not at a market discount. Windows are capped and never guaranteed; in a heavy quarter, requests are filled pro-rata, and new units hold for a year before their first window.
Conservatively. Marks are drawn from the most recent financings, observed secondary transactions, and comparable evidence, with judgment applied and an independent audit annually. The full valuation policy lives in the prospectus.
The register is in assembly and the vehicle is in formation. First close follows the prospectus; the first letter follows the first close. Request the prospectus below and we will write to you. On paper, if you give us an address.
Everything the index thinks, in writing, quarterly. Sealed for partners; published openly one year later. The first letter accompanies the first close.
Buying private companies well is a trust business. The index is kept by two people who spent their careers earning it: building in New York, investing from Paris, and backing Europe's founders before the consensus arrived.
Three companies built, two acquired, one named a TIME Best Invention: Producteev, ILY, Willo. Two decades in New York as the bridge between European founders and American capital: angel since 2012, with early positions in Checkr, Algolia, Alan, Wit.ai and Sunrise; general partner of Origins. He has watched Europe's best companies get built from both shores. Now he holds them.
Goldman Sachs, where he helped build a consumer bank. Earlybird, where he learned European venture. Meta, where he led startups and venture for France. Then Origins, the fund he co-founded and runs as general partner, with more than fifty investments, several now category leaders. A decade inside the rooms where Europe's private companies are priced. Now he keeps the register.
Partnership begins with the prospectus and a conversation, in that order. We reply to every serious letter within the week. On paper, when you give us an address.