$94bn of infrastructure funds coming to market

There are nearly $94 billion of infrastructure funds in market or thought to be coming to market in the next 12 months, according to data released by placement agent Probitas Partners.

As of October, Probitas counted 63 funds worldwide, excluding funds that it is currently placing, that are or will be fundraising for investments in the infrastructure sector.

More than half the funds are targeting more than $1 billion. The three largest current or planned fundraisings are by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts Infrastructure Fund, Goldman Sachs Infrastructure Partners II and Macquarie European Infrastructure Fund III, according to Probitas. A person familiar with KKR said the firm is targeting closer to $5 billion. 

Actual funds raised have continued to stay strong despite the difficult market environment. Probitas estimates that $21.5 billion has been raised in the sector in the first nine months of the year.  The amount is already more than the 2006 total of $17.9 billion, though it is less than the $34.3 billion raised in 2007. By comparison, in 2004 just $2.4 billion was raised by infrastructure funds.

“It’s pretty typical of what we’ve seen over the last few years. The largest funds coming to market are the large global funds and as you go down the list, the smaller funds there are going to be more [region] specific”, said Kelly DePonte, a parter at Probitas.

DePonte said that India in particular is receiving a lot of attention from investors. Six India-specific funds totaling $6.2 billion are on the Probitas list. “It seemed like every time I turned around there was a new Indian infrastructure fund being raised,” DePonte said. 

The top 20 funds from the Probitas fundraising list, re-ranked by target size and converted at spot rates as of press time into US dollars, is reproduced below.

Infrastructure funds in market or thought coming to market over the next 12 months, as of October 2008