WOOD & Company is dedicated Central European investment banking house with headquarters in Prague. The company was founded by Richard Wood, a senior ex-Salomon Brothers executive, in 1991. Since its establishment, the company has focused on high quality equity broking and investment banking services in Central Europe. At present, the company has offices in Prague and Bratislava and is a member of the Prague, Vienna, Frankfurt, Warsaw, Budapest, Lubljana and Sofia stock exchanges.
Since its foundation, the firm has been the most active stockbroker on the Prague Stock Exchange, dating back to the launch of the Czech capital market in 1993. WOOD & Company executed on the Prague Stock Exchange the first transaction for foreign institutional investors ever and since then has maintained its leading position in equity broking services.
Over the past decade, the firm has expanded its scope of activities to a full range of investment banking and corporate finance services including large scale privatizations, initial public offerings, capital markets transactions, mergers and acquisitions, fund raising, and corporate advisory to foreign corporate clients, and domestic issuers and institutions.
In 2001, Richard Wood decided to retire from the investment banking business in Central Europe and agreed with the local management team, consisting of Jan Sýkora, Vladimír Jaroš, Andrea Ferancová and Lubomír Šoltys, on a friendly management buy-out. All of the four partners have been members of the WOOD & Company team for more than 10 years and all are involved in day-to-day management and business execution. Commitment and business dedication of the firm's partners is one of our key competitive advantages.
In 2007 leading nordic investment bank Straumur Burdaras headquartered in Iceland has acquired 50% stake in WOOD & Company and become and became a co-owner.The partners of WOOD & Co will continue to be fully responsible for management and development of WOOD’s business Gross Central and Southeastern Europe.
WOOD & Company aims to be the best financial services provider in Central Europe by offering its clients the firm's breadth of regional experience, capabilities, and financial resources.