Flavio: Valuation of Orlando City at more then $494 million

• by Paul Kennedy  @pkedit, Mar 29, 2018

Albert Friedberg, a Toronto-based investor, has purchased a minority interest in Orlando City.

Brazilian Flavio Augusto da Silva is the majority owner of Orlando City, which operates teams in the NWSL and USL in addition to its MLS team. It owns the 25,500-seat Orlando City Stadium that opened in 2017.

In a Facebook post, Flavio said he sold an 8.63 percent ownership stake in Orlando City, which he valued at 1.63 billion reals, or more than $494 million.

The French-born Friedberg is the founder and president of Friedberg Mercantile Group Ltd., a Toronto-based investment firm, and president of the FCMI group of companies with investments in real estate, mining and forestry operations. 

"The U.S. soccer market has shown signs of great strength, which we’ve seen at both the club and league level,” said Flavio. "We have been approached by interested investors over the years, but I committed enough capital to carry out each step of this project so far and kept expansion opportunities on the back burner. Today, however, we have taken the opportunity to become partners with an experienced and strategic investor in Albert, who, in addition to financial contributions, brings strong business and finance knowledge to help with projects that lie ahead for the improvement of our product on and off the field.”