Group

Venture capital, private equity and M&A

We are legal, tax and accounting advisors in the field of M&A, Venture capital and private equity. We advise on venture capital investments in high-growth companies (startups). We provide transactional advisory services on the legal, tax and accounting side for both sellers and buyers.
As part of our VC and PE advisory services, we also provide comprehensive legal, tax and accounting advice on the setup of employee and contractor compensation plans (ESOPs). We design and structure ESOP schemes for clients, prepare ESOP contractual documentation, and also provide tax and tax assessments of specific ESOP structures.

The right time to sell a business does not exist as a one-size-fits-all dictum. In practice, it is triggered either by a specific offer from ...
Two-thirds of Slovaks are struggling to make ends meet and companies are struggling with tied-up capital, lack of access to financing and low flexibility. And ...
Selling a business is one of the most important moments for owners in their business journey. However, it often does not come without obstacles. Family ...
Slovakia has a lot of smart people, but fewer and fewer reasons why they would want to do business here. Tatiana Ondrejková, founder of Pelikan, ...
Interview with Tatiana Ondrejková (CEO Pelikán) and Tomáš Dem (CEO Highgate Group) about: ► how the business environment in Slovakia is changing, ► why transaction ...
In an interview with Tomas Dem and Karol Balca, we look at the biggest myths and hard facts about valuing companies and selling a business. ...
Selling a business is a life event for most owners – and often the only such deal in their career. Yet, in Slovakia, we encounter ...
The demography of Slovakia is collapsing. The number of children born is declining, young people are leaving, businesses are facing turnover and lack of loyalty. ...
How do you retain key employees without costing you double their salary by taking advantage of blockchain technology? In this episode of Highgate Talks, we ...
What are the tax, commercial and criminal risks associated with the use of company funds for private purposes? This question was also dealt with in ...
Interview with Tatiana Ondrejková (CEO Pelikán) and Tomáš Dem (CEO Highgate Group) about: ► how the business environment in Slovakia is changing, ► why transaction ...
In an interview with Tomas Dem and Karol Balca, we look at the biggest myths and hard facts about valuing companies and selling a business. ...
How do you retain key employees without costing you double their salary by taking advantage of blockchain technology? In this episode of Highgate Talks, we ...
What are the tax, commercial and criminal risks associated with the use of company funds for private purposes? This question was also dealt with in ...
Tomáš Demo, attorney and partner of Highgate Group, gave an interview for TREND weekly, where he presented the most common pitfalls when selling a company. ...
On 12 March 2025, entrepreneurs and investment experts met at The SPOT in Bratislava for a conference on financing opportunities for growing companies. Experts from ...
Selling a business is a complex process where entrepreneurs can make a number of mistakes that will negatively affect the final course of the transaction. ...
Today, employers face challenges in retaining quality workers, as many employees prefer trends such as sabbatical or job hopping. Conventional across-the-board benefits are often no ...
In addition to the valuation, the second key condition of the sale is the amount of the purchase price and its payment. The amount of ...
Legal & Tax Committee SLOVCA has a new leader. Following approval by the Board of Directors, Peter Varga, co-founder and partner of Highgate Group, was ...
Highgate Law & Tax has once again scored an outstanding success in the prestigious Law Firm of the Year competition, where it has maintained its ...
We welcomed more than 200 attendees to our largest conference to date, which focused on real estate financing through various regulatory and tax structures. We ...
We like to do things differently, we even enjoy doing things differently. And obviously this approach proved to be successful when we organized a conference ...
The sale of a company or the entry of an investor is often a key milestone in the lives of business owners and founders. Despite ...
Both small and larger Slovak or foreign investment funds investing in real estate enjoy constant high attention among Slovaks. However, in addition to setting up ...
Employee stock option plans (ESOPs) have become standard in Slovak companies in recent years. And not only in start-ups, but also in larger and profitable ...
We advise a large number of Slovak start-ups and existing digital and IT companies in the areas of law, tax and accounting. We have a ...
In the era of the digital economy, skilled and experienced employees are often a company’s most valuable asset. Technology and high-growth companies in particular are ...
Video recording from the largest Slovak conference on M&A private equity and venture capital on 13 March 2025: 4 . conference block | 14:35 - ...
Video recording from the largest Slovak conference on M&A private equity and venture capital on 13 March 2025: 3 . conference block | 13:00 - ...
Video recording from the largest Slovak conference on M&A private equity and venture capital on 13 March 2025: 2 . conference block | 10:25 - ...
Video recording from the largest Slovak conference on M&A private equity and venture capital on 13 March 2025: 1 . conference block | 9:00 - ...
Video recording from the largest Slovak conference on M&A private equity and venture capital on 13 March 2025: Full conference | 9:00 - 16:30 Topics: ...
Video recording from the Real Estate - Taxes and Financing Conference. Panel: Financovanie nehnuteľností Presented by Tomáš Demo (Highgate Group) Panelists Miroslav Hilčík (Wood & ...
The aim of the conference specifically dedicated to ESOPs was to show best practices ofdifferent types of such structures in a comprehensible way. This is ...
This is a recording of a 55-minute lecture from our conference on legal and tax optimization for technology companies (more info here), which we organized ...
If you are a business owner considering a sale or an investor looking to acquire a business – prepare yourself for a new market situation. ...
  Last Thursday we managed to do something extraordinary. ✨ At our conference, we provided business owners with know-how from owners of “exited” companies, transaction ...
  Although bank financing is the standard for M&A transactions, it is not the only option, with various regulated structures providing an alternative. Examples include ...
EBITDA OUR DAILY, GIVE US TODAY. When a company is sold, the purchase price is in most cases calculated through a transaction multiple of EBITDA ...
WE’VE GOT A BIT OF A PROBLEM HERE. IN THE VALUATION OF SHARES IN THE COMPANY. Recently, another case has come to us, which in ...
A PART OF SALES AND INVESTMENT IN SLOVAK COMPANIES FAILS IN PROCESS. I have been doing my internal statistics. We at Highgate Law & Tax ...
TRANSACTION ADVISORY FOR GENESIS GROWTH EQUITY FUND We provided comprehensive transaction advisory services to Genesis Growth Equity Fund on the acquisition of an 80% stake ...
HOW DO YOU PROTECT THE ASSETS AND BUSINESS BUILT UP OVER YEARS IN AN UNREFORMED COUNTRY ? We recently published our next podcast(https://bitly.cx/GPTln), where my ...
I HAVE A PARTNER IN MY COMPANY WHO ONLY “KNOWS” (dead equity). CAN I FIRE HIM? The situation when after years some partners at best ...
WITHIN SEVEN YEARS WE WANT TO BE THE LEADER IN THE SLOVAK TOOTH CLINICS MARKET 💪 These words were said to me almost a year ...
  • Comprehensive tax and legal transaction advisory services to the seller on the sale of a 90% stake in DETOX s.r.o., one of the most important companies operating in the field of industrial waste processing on the Slovak market;
  • Tax and legal advisory services to the investment group Ethernum Capital on the creation of an acquisition JV structure with the private equity fund ETERUS Capital a.s., whose investment intention is consolidation acquisitions of pharmacies in the Slovak Republic;
  • Complete legal advisory services to the acquirer of a 100% stake in EQUUS a.s., the largest producer of frozen vegetables on the Slovak market;
  • Tax and legal advisory services to the globally operating Atlas Copco group in connection with the acquisition of 100% of the business share in the Slovak company ACJ;
  • Legal advisory services to SEC Technologies, a major Slovak company developing a unique gas detector for the defence industry, on the preparation and negotiation of transaction documentation regulating the provision of venture capital investment by a company from the Crowdberry group;
  • Transactional advisory services to the innovative company FUERGY on EUR 16 million investment from the investment group Pro Partners Holding;
  • We provided comprehensive tax and legal transactional advice to StudentMarketing s.r.o., doing business as BONARD, (a leader in collecting, editing and making available unique data from the construction, sale and lease of commercial and residential real estate) and its founder (and partner) on the sale of a minority stake in a private equity fund company – Spire Capital. Our advice included assisting in the investor due diligence phase, tax and legal analysis, designing and implementing a transaction structure involving carve-out of a portion of the company’s assets not to be included in the sale, and advising on the preparation and negotiation of the transaction documentation for the sale (SPA, SHA);
  • We advised VALLOS s.r.o. (specialising in the development and production of complex packaging solutions) and its founders (and shareholders) on the sale of 100% of the shares of NEFAB, a global provider of packaging and logistics services, on a tax and legal transaction. Our advice included assisting with the investor due diligence phase, tax and legal analysis, designing and implementing a transaction structure involving the spin-off of a portion of the company’s assets not to be included in the sale, and advising on the preparation and negotiation of the transaction documentation for the sale;
  • We advised Photoneo s.r.o. and its founders on a tax and legal transaction involving the sale of part of the company’s business to Zebra Technologies, one of the leading real-time sensing and analytics companies. This was a complex, multi-step transaction involving an auction process. Our advice included assisting with the due diligence phase, tax and legal analysis and design of a potential transaction structure, advising on the settlement of an existing key employee remuneration scheme and advising the company founders on the drafting of the company’s sale agreement (being prepared by Dentons’ lead adviser);
  • As a sub-supplier of legal services for the Slovak Republic, we advised České dráhy, a.s. and ČD Cargo, a.s. in connection with the acquisition of a controlling stake in a group of companies controlled by Českomoravská železniční opravna, s.r.o. Our advisory services consisted in conducting a robust legal due diligence of the Slovak company ČMŽO – Slovakia s.r.o., which as one of the subsidiaries falls within the perimeter of the transaction;
  • We advised Genesis Growth Equity Fund on the acquisition of an 80% stake in TechPlasty (a major Slovak producer of technical plastics). Our advisory services included: (i) legal and tax due diligence of the target company, (ii) advising on the negotiation of the acquisition financing documentation (loan agreement, pledge agreements, escrow agreement), (iii) establishing and setting up the structure using the acquisition SPV, (iv) drafting and negotiating the transaction documentation (SPA, SHA), (v) drafting and negotiating the accompanying corporate documentation (general meetings, waivers of claims, performance agreements);
  • We provided comprehensive tax and legal advice to VOSEM Group, a company operating several shopping centres and operations in the Slovak Republic, on the acquisition of 100% of shares in ARCOLA, a.s., a company operating the OC Cassovia shopping centre in Košice. Our advisory services consisted in conducting an in-depth legal and tax due diligence of the target company and the real estate owned by it and partial advisory services regarding the preparation of the transaction documentation.
  • For an innovative Slovak company developing advanced AI automated systems using 3D cameras, we provided (i) legal advice to the founders in conducting comprehensive legal due diligence of the investors, and (ii) tax audit services to the target company for the investor IPM Group;
  • We represented Dedoles s.r.o. in connection with a restructuring investment provided in the form of a convertible loan by the Crowdberry investment platform. Our comprehensive transactional advice included advising on investor due diligence, commenting on loan documentation, founder and investor call option documentation, future shareholder agreement documentation and documentation on corporate governance arrangements at the target company level.
  • We represented Crowdberry, the leading Slovak investment platform, in its co-investment with Slovak Investment Holding in GymBeam, a leading Central European e-commerce company selling sports nutrition products. For Crowdberry as an investor, we commented on the complete transaction documentation for the conversion of the investment into additional shares in the target company, advised on certain additional legal and tax due diligence issues and represented the company in negotiations with the founders and co-investors.
  • We represented Isadore Apparel and its founders, the Velits brothers, in another investment round, in which a group of investors provided a EUR 2.1 million investment in the form of a convertible loan through the Crowdberry platform. We represented the target company and the founders in the negotiations and commenting on the transaction documentation, the preparation of a new version of the shareholders’ agreement and the tax set-up of the entire structure. The intention of the investment was to strengthen the brand’s position, particularly in Western European markets, and to prepare the company for the entry of a foreign investor from the industry.
  • We advised the founder and the company altFINS – a company among the top 10 growing Slovak startups in 2021(https://www.eu-startups.com/2021/01/10-rising-star-startups-from-slovakia-to-watch-in-2021/ ) on its next investment round, in which the company raised co-investment from the Crowdberry investment platform and one of its existing shareholders. We represented the founder and the company in investor due diligence and in the negotiation of the investment agreement and the new shareholder agreement in the company.
  • We provided additional complex legal advice to Crowdberry’s investment platform on its seed A investment in NetCore, a company that develops innovative software solutions for network management. For Crowdberry, we provided full legal due-diligence of the target company, prepared investment documentation and represented it in negotiations with the founders of the target company. For the target company, this was the first round of external financing providing funds to expand the team and develop new software solutions.
  • We represented a major Slovak angel investor in its investment in the first external investment round in Footshop, one of the largest online retailers of streetwear and lifestyle footwear and apparel in Central and Eastern Europe with an annual turnover of EUR 30 million. EUR. Footshop intends to use the investment for acquisitions or opening new flagship (brick-and-mortar) stores and digital innovations. As part of the investment round, we advised the investor on the transaction documentation.
  • We provided additional complex legal advice to the Crowdberry investment platform on its Seed A investment in REFRESHER Media s.r.o., which operates a unique digital media portal for the younger generation. We provided Crowdberry with a complete legal due-diligence of the target company, prepared investment documentation, shareholders’ agreement and represented it in negotiations with the founders of the target company.

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