Zdeněk Bakala

Zdeněk Bakala is a Czech-American businessman, investor and philanthropist. After a career in investment banking in the United States and the United Kingdom, he returned to Czechoslovakia in 1991 and founded Patria Finance in 1994. In 2004, an investor group led by Bakala acquired Karbon Invest, the majority owner of the coal-mining company OKD. The mining business was later reorganized under New World Resources (NWR), which was listed on the London, Prague and Warsaw stock exchanges in 2008. The same year, Bakala acquired the Czech media company Economia.