PE Hub’s Connie Loizos has an interview with Craig Cooper, who recently joined the VC firm founded by Israeli billionaire and media mogul Haim Saban:

Saban Capital quietly entered the business of venture capital a few months ago, adding an early-stage digital media practice to his seven-year-old, L.A.-based investment company, Saban Capital Group. For the uninitiated, Saban is a former television producer whose Saban Entertainment company gave the world, for better or worse, “Mighty Morphin Power Rangers” in the ‘90s [Editor’s note: Saban also wrote the “Inspector Gadget” theme song].

Cooper hasn’t pulled the trigger on any investments yet. But in a short phone conversation, we talked a bit about Richard Yen, who joined Cooper in June from Blueprint Ventures; we discussed his focus on digital media and consumer wireless startups; and he explained why he’s cut back on his daily dose of TechCrunch.First, how did you meet Haim Saban?

I was a partner in the Softbank Tech Fund when we were first raising it in 2004, and Haim was an investor, and I got to know him very well. We started talking in the middle of 2007 about his position in LA and his capital.

Was that a long conversation? Fortune magazine estimates his net worth is more than $2 billion. How much is he giving you to invest?

We have an allocation that we don’t publicly disclose, but we have a lot of dry powder.

What’s your role within the broader firm?

Well, we’re investing in companies on a standalone basis, but also looking across all of Saban’s investments in the context of how what we do might drive larger private equity deals. Facebook was a tiny startup just a few years ago, if you remember. So it’s very much a cross-platform intelligence-based platform that we’re trying to build.

What amounts are you looking to put to work?

I was Israel last month looking at early-stage deals in the range of $100,000 to $500,000; we’ll also look at deals that are between $10 million and $20 million. Because we don’t have any LPs telling us what to invest, we have a lot of flexibility.

Who’s “we”? Will Saban himself need approve every deal you want to do?

It’s effectively a group decision. We have an investment committee that includes Haim, [Saban Capital Group COO] Adam Chesnoff, and myself, and we run the practice like a traditional investment firm. We have weekly meetings and the whole team contributes into deals. So the private equity guys tells us what they’re seeing and we tell them what we’re seeing; we think that approach gives us a better overview of what’s happening across the spectrum.

Are you primarily targeting the LA area as you look to invest in digital media and wireless startups?

Our initial focus is on the San Francisco-San Diego corridor. But we’re going to be looking internationally. The U.K. and European markets are big for the rest of Saban Capital, and we have strong links into Israel as well. In fact, we’re hosting a tour of 15 Israeli companies that are coming through LA this fall, and some of our strategic partners will come and meet those companies. There’s a lot incubation over there – and some very unique ideas.

There are two of you and 10 guys on the private equity side. Will that even out over time?

We’ll certainly look to scale the group as we scale our invsestments. Hopefully we’ll have enough deals that we’ll need to bring on additional resources, but we haven’t contemplated that yet.

Where are you getting your deal flow? Who do you see most down in LA?

I’m doing a lot with [former AOL CEO] Jon Miller, but I was also here in LA for Softbank. And historically, because of my wireless background, I’ve had big deal flow through that channel. There are only a few people in terms of digital media in LA who see most of the deals and I’m probably one of them. That said, if someone is raising money, that’s a flag for me. I’m looking for independent opportunities that I can develop.

You don’t want to see entrepreneurs who are raising money?

I want to invest in companies that I find, whether they are raising money or not. There’s so much clutter in our economy. Everyone is jumping on digital media. Look at our principal news sources: mocoNews, TechCrunch. There’s no competitive advantage anymore except to break out of the pack and actively identify deals that you think are promising. Otherwise, I’m just reading TechCrunch and calling the same guys that everyone else is.

How are you finding these companies that aren’t soliciting funding?
I read 50 to 100 magazines a week. I’m continually hunting for information about new opportunities. I just pride myself on finding things that no one else has identified. I cold call a lot of people.

Read the full interview here

Analysts are applauding Merrill Lynch’s attempt to cut its losses and raise more capital, but investors may be forgiven if they take the company’s remarks with several large grains of sodium chloride. CEO John Thain repeatedly insisted that Merrill was well-capitalized over the last eight months, yet the bank still had to go back for another $8.5 billion.

Below are a selection of comments by Thain and other executives, in reverse chronological order.

“Right now we believe that we are in a very comfortable spot in terms of our capital.” (July 17, 2008 — Thain on a conference call after posting Merrill’s second-quarter results)

“Today on a pro forma basis we have about $44 billion of equity capital, which actually isn’t very much below the all-time high that Merrill ever had. And our philosophy about this is that we are well-capitalized. We’re comfortable with our capital position. We, like everyone else, are deleveraging our balance sheet.” (June 11, 2008 — Thain on a conference call hosted by Deutsche Bank)

“John Thain has been very clear that we have sufficient capital and don’t have a need to raise additional common equity for the foreseeable future. When we raised this capital in January, we had a lot of demand so we went beyond what we needed.” (May 12, 2008 — Merrill President Greg Fleming in an interview with the Times of London)

“We deliberately raised more capital than we lost last year … we believe that will allow us to not have to go back to the equity market in the foreseeable future.” (April 8, 2008 — Thain to reporters in Tokyo, as reported by Reuters)

“In 2007, we lost 8.6 billion dollars after tax, but we raised 12.8 billion dollars in new capital. We raised significantly more capital than we lost. And we did that on purpose so that we could say to the marketplace that we raised more than enough capital. We replaced all the capital we lost. We have plenty of capital going forward, and we don’t need to come back into the equity market. The goal is to maintain our current ratings. No more capital raising; I’m sure we have enough capital.” (April 4, 2008 — Thain in an interview with Japan’s Nihon Keizai Shimbun)

“We have more capital than we need, so we can say to the market that we don’t need more injections. We can confirm that we have tackled the problem.” (March 16, 2008 — Thain in an interview with Spain’s El Pais newspaper)

“…Today I can say that we will not need additional funds. These problems are behind us. We will not return to the market.” (March 8, 2008 — Thain in an interview with France’s Le Figaro newspaper)

“We’re very confident that we have the capital base now that we need to go forward in 2008.” (January 18, 2008 — Thain as quoted by the New York Times).

“…These transactions make certain that Merrill is well-capitalized.” (January 15, 2008 — Thain in a statement after selling $6.6 billion of preferred shares to a group that included Japanese and Kuwaiti investors)

“One of my first priorities at Merrill Lynch was to strengthen the firm’s balance sheet, and today we have made great progress towards that by bolstering our capital position through these investments and our announced sale of Merrill Lynch Capital.” (December 24, 2007 — Thain in a statement when Merrill announced a $6.2 billion capital raising)

(Reporting by Martin Howell)

Fresh capital from wealth fund Temasek Holdings may do plenty to clean up Merrill Lynch’s balance sheet, and has the potential to boost the Singapore wealth fund’s stake in the struggling investment behemoth to 15 percent. That could be an uncomfortable level for U.S. politicians, and breaches a previously informal agreement to refrain from owning more than 10 percent of Merrill, according to a source familiar with the fund. A Temasek spokeswoman said on Tuesday that a portion of the deal is subject to regulatory approval. Citigroup is the other big U.S. bank to have gone to foreign wealth funds for big buckets of bail-out funding. If it ends up having to take more CDO-related write-downs to match the new bargain basement price one assumes Temasek is paying for its new stock of Merrill shares (they aren’t saying what the price might be) this whole thing could turn very political just as the race for the White House enters the final stretch.

British Airways says it is in talks with Spanish carrier Iberia about a potential all-share merger, sending shares in the UK airline up nearly 9 percent. Britain’s flagship carrier said in a statement the discussions had the support of both companies, although it expected it would take several months before terms could be agreed. BA’s chief executive, Willie Walsh, said the move made sense in current market conditions. BA owns 13.15 percent of the Spanish carrier, while Iberia has taken a 2.99 percent direct stake in BA, on top of exposure to a further 6.99 percent through contracts for differences linked to the BA share price. BA said both parties were confident of securing regulatory approval, adding that the European Union had already allowed the duo to cooperate widely.

Other deals of the day:

* Japanese TV and media group Tokyo Broadcasting System said it would spend $195 million to buy a majority stake in retailer StylingLife Holdings from Citigroup’s merchant banking unit in Japan.

* Central European Media Enterprises has bought an 80 percent stake in two Bulgarian television stations for $172 million, expanding its reach in eastern Europe, the company said.

* Kumho Tires is seeking investors to take over a $109 million stake in itself that U.S.-based Cooper Tire & Rubber plans to sell, an official at the South Korean company said.

* Autoliv, the world’s biggest maker of air bags and seat belts, said it had agreed to buy the automotive radar sensors business of Tyco Electronics for $42 million.

* IT and engineering services firm Rolta India said it acquired Chicago-based WhittmanHart Consulting, a division of WhittmanHart Inc.