In 2020, the Czech transaction team of international law firm Bird & Bird started advising KB SmartSolutions, s.r.o. ("KBSS"), a subsidiary of Komerční banka, a.s. (a member of the Société Générale Group), through which Komerční banka, a.s. invests in modern technologies in the field of financial services and thus significantly contributes to the transformation of traditional banking institutions into innovative and technologically strong new generation banks.
Bird & Bird provides legal support to KBSS acting as a strategic investor in selected FinTech projects.
One of the very successful projects is KBSS's capital entry into upvest s.r.o. ("upvest"), which mainly provides investments in real estate development projects through crowdfunding. So far, upvest has facilitated more than 13,000 investments with a total value of more than one billion Czech crowns.
Since its strategic entry into upvest in 2020, KBSS has decided to significantly increase its equity participation in this company. The transaction took place in the form of a share transfer and KBSS became the majority shareholder of the company. The transaction was led by partner Ivan Sagál and supported by Ľubomír Brečka, Martina Waliczková, Martin Dolnák and Karolína Rösler.
Bird & Bird focuses on providing strategic advice to companies that are affected by the digital environment and new technologies or contribute to it through their activities. The Bird & Bird team has long been involved in FinTech and technology-oriented M&A transactions and has gained international respect for its know-how in the digital economy, as evidenced by the many prestigious awards Bird & Bird has received.
