Kotak Mahindra’s private equity group is raising about $300 million or about Rs 1,350 crore for an infrastructure fund. It has lined up Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation and Brookfield Asset Management as cornerstone investors, and along with Kotak, will invest about $68 million as their contribution.
The fund will invest in sectors such as power, transport –ports, roads and airports, water treatment and supply, waste management, gas transmission, distribution and storage facilities and in infrastructure holding companies.
Kotak Investment Advisors, which manages about $1.2 billion of alternate assets, will manage the funds raised from the domestic market. Kotak Mahindra (UK), which along with associates manages about 1.9 billion dollars of funds, will manage the offshore fund.
Suman Saha will head the investment team. He was earlier the executive director and co-head, equity product group, at Kotak Investment Banking, where he has worked on infrastructure-related assignments. The group plans to supplement capital market funding which infrastructure companies have access to, with early stage financing from private equity funds.
Infrastructure spending has slowed down in fiscal 2011. The government has allocated significant funds for infrastructure in the Budget, and made some funding-related announcements, which has led to hopes that the sector may see faster growth in the years ahead.