First State Investments, the international arm of Colonial First State Global Asset Management (CFSGAM), has raised €2.1bn for a second European infrastructure fund.
As previously reported, CFSGAM, the Sydney-based manager, owned by Australia’s largest bank, Commonwealth, was looking to raise capital for its second global infrastructure fund.
The fund manager said European Diversified Infrastructure Fund II (EDIF II) has completed its second fundraising series as a result of new and extended commitments from global institutional investors.
EDIF II initially raised €700m for its first series in March 2017 and planned to raise €900m for the second series but had to increase the target.
First State said the second series closed last month at €1.4bn, taking EDIF II to total commitments of €2.1bn.
EDIF II pursues the same investment strategy as the previous EDIF I fund. It will invest in a core and core-plus infrastructure portfolio of assets primarily targeting energy, utility and transportation investments across Europe.
The fund is aiming to raise commitments across three distinct series of fundraising and has an overall hard cap of €2.5bn.
The manager said EDIF II has closed three transactions to date and has signed its fourth and fifth investments, which it expects to close in June.
Once closed, these will complete the full deployment of 100% of investor commitments in the first series and will begin the deployment of the newly-raised second series, the manager said.
Niall Mills, infrastructure investments partner at First State, said: “We greatly value the confidence our existing and new investors have placed in us.
“We are pleased with the pace of deployment, but we remain focused on pricing discipline and adhering to our stated strategy. We look forward to further successes in the coming months.”
Marcus Ayre, infrastructure investments partner at First State, said: “Since the March 2017 close of the first series fundraising, we are pleased the fund has invested or committed to invest, in five high-quality, European, mid-market infrastructure businesses, in line with the Fund’s strategy.
“With the success of the second series fundraising, we continue to see a strong pipeline of attractive investment opportunities for the Fund, both as follow-on investments with which to grow our existing portfolio companies and from high-quality stand-alone opportunities.”
