Penta is a Central Europe investment group founded in 1994 in Slovakia by Czech Marek Dospiva and Slovaks Jaroslav Haščák, Juraj Herko, Martin Kúšik and Jozef Oravkin.

Today, the group actively develops companies and projects, primarily in healthcare, financial services, retail, manufacturing, real estate and media.

At the end of 1993, Marek Dospiva, Jaroslav Haščák and Jozef Oravkin teamed up with Martin Kúšik and Juraj Herko and founded company Penta Brokers.

At this key moment, Penta succeeded in convincing VÚB to sell its share and finance the purchase of stocks bought by the British fund.

In 2005, Penta has changed its structure to that of a standard private equity company and in the same year started investing also into real estate and expanding into other foreign markets beyond Slovakia and Czech Republic, primarily into Poland through the acquisition of Żabka, the country's largest independent food retail chain with more than 2000 stores, which was completed in the summer of 2007.

The first move to this market was Bratislava Digital Park, an exclusive administrative complex, which has won prestigious architecture awards in Slovakia and abroad.

The company is listed on the Warsaw Stock Exchange and is a leading distributor of media and entertainment products, clothing, shoes, toys and accessories for children, cosmetics as well as language courses.

The EM&F Group companies have been successfully building their strong market position for years, have an extensive retail network and a large, stable customer base.

Florentinum's quality architecture has garnered it the highest local and international awards (CEEQA – best office in CEE) and is certified LEED Platinum.

[18] A year later the Bory Mall retail centre in Slovakia was completed and Penta started to build a new residential development in the Walter factory brownfield in Prague.

[25] Penta's rise is sometimes seen as exemplary for how Czechoslovakia's Communist Nomenklatura and its offspring have been benefitting from the transition to Capitalism and their resulting grip on power in business and politics today.

[3] The scandal evolved around the publication of transcripts of conversations between high-level business, law enforcement and politics, pointing to dubious deal-making and reminding many of the highly corrupt 1990s.

Two figures quoted in and incriminated by the transcripts are former Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico and Penta founder Jaroslav Haščák.

[28] Amidst cries of censorship and widespread condemnation of international press groups Haščák succeeded to block the publishing of journalist Tom Nicholson's book covering the subject by way of preliminary injunction, until a court overturned the restraining order.