Rosario Cannata is investment manager at EDP Ventures Brasil, a corporate venture capital (CVC) vehicle for Portugal-headquartered energy utility Energias de Portugal (EDP). EDP is present in 16 countries in the whole energy chain, from generation – wind, solar, hydro and thermoelectric – to transmission – more than 1,400 km of transmission lines being built in Brazil – and distribution – over 11 million clients in Brazil, Portugal and Spain.
EDP Ventures has three investment vehicles with a total amount of €72m ($79.6m) under management and with teams based in Lisbon, Madrid and São Paulo. Cannata is responsible for the vehicle in São Paulo, which started out with an initial amount of around €7m ($7.7m), and he is tasked with identifying investment opportunities in Latin America.
He said: “I have been involved with EDP Ventures for the past two years, participating in the entire approval process, defining the investment strategy and the setup of the local investment vehicle.
“This is my first experience in a formal CVC as I always worked in mergers and acquisitions (M&A) at EDP and other companies in Brazil and the US.”
In addition to M&A, Cannata has also worked in project finance, participating in transactions between $500m and $1bn for nearly a decade. He said CVC gave him an opportunity to make a real impact on people and businesses, adding: “I also have the opportunity to help the startups with validation of the technology and product development and revenues.”
As EDP Ventures Brasil started its operations in September 2018, it does not have exits as yet. He considers the unit’s second investment in mid-2019 for data integration software provider Dom Rock’s R$6.5m ($1.7m) to be a success because it had undergone a complex negotiation process led by Cannata.
A native Italian born in Sicily, Cannata moved to Milan to study economics at Bocconi University, before moving to England, Venezuela, the Dominican Republic and eventually took an analyst role at investment bank Chicago Investment Group in New York.
Cannata moved to Brazil in 2010 to work for oil major Schahin Petróleo e Gás and has been in Brazil since. Besides his CVC duties, he is also a business angel and he had been an entrepreneur for three years.
