AMP Capital has moved quickly to fill vacancies created by the departure of seven members of the team that ran its Australasian social infrastructure fund, drawing on staff from within the broader infrastructure equity team.

Trent Mikkonen has been appointed principal, head of social asset management, Andrew Jones has been promoted to investment director, while Chris Iemma, an existing associate director in the infrastructure team, will now focus on the Community Infrastructure Fund (CommIF).

An AMP Capital spokesperson said another team member would take on an expanded role to provide support to CommIF’s portfolio manager Charles Savage.

The appointments follow the departure of seven fund managers to Plenary, which is among bidders vying to take over CommIF.

“These appointments reflect the deep bench of talent within [our] infrastructure equity [business], which has more than 60 investment professionals,” the spokesperson told IPE Real Assets.

“As we have reminded clients in recent weeks, the success of the fund has been due to the contribution of more than 90 people across our organisation, who directly and indirectly support the fund.” 

The co-heads of AMP infrastructure equity Australia and New Zealand, Michael Bessell and Michael Cummings, oversee the CommIF business. The core management of CommIF remained unchanged, with Savage continuing in his role as portfolio manager, the spokesperson said.

IPE Real Assets understands that AMP Capital has been in touch with unitholders about approaches to acquire CommIF. “They are comfortable that it has a strong team that continues to manage the fund,” a source said.

CommIF has attracted three separate takeover bids from Plenary, Palisade Investment Partners and Morrison & Co.

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