Cezary Podkul

A feeder fund raised by an affiliate of private equity firm Yucaipa will invest in large infrastructure and real estate assets, with OMERS chief executive Michael Nobrega hoping to have US participants identified by the end of the year.

The Georgia Department of Transportation has issued a request for qualifications for ‘West by Northwest’, a highway project aimed at easing congestion in the Metro Atlanta area. It is the first project being procured under a PPP bill signed into law last year.

LAZ Parking has acquired 89 parking contracts from GE Capital Real Estate-owned InterPark. InterPark CFO Douglas Poirier says the sale is a ‘strategic shift’ for the company away from service-oriented businesses toward real estate ownership.

An independent review panel could be selected by the end of Q1 as the Port of Virginia evaluates three bids from The Carlyle Group, Goldman Sachs and real estate manager CenterPoint Properties.

The private equity firm’s Marc Lipschultz says the market will have a choice between ‘Version 1.0’ and ‘Version 2.0’ of infrastructure investing. Lipschultz also describes how he has built out his firm’s infrastructure team and how KKR views infrastructure assets and the overall investing opportunity in the sector

Kohlberg Kravis Roberts is hoping to create a new paradigm for investing in infrastructure. Part of its ‘toolkit’ involves people with experience in crackers – but not the RJR Nabisco kind. Cezary Podkul caught up with infrastructure pointmen Marc Lipschultz and Raj Agrawal to find out more

Serge-Alexandre Lauper will serve as the co-head of investment management for Swiss Re Private Equity Partners. He left Horizon21, the Swiss alternative asset manager with a fund-of-funds for infrastructure, about two weeks ago.

The firm run by the former vice chairman of Morgan Stanley has agreed a joint-venture with Infinity Capital Partners of Atlanta, Georgia to invest up to $100m in the transportation sector. Assets from railcars and vessels to commercial real estate and credit card receivables will fall under the joint venture’s investment strategy.

The proceeds comprise $408m of initial commitments the firm has raised for its Mexican infrastructure fund, which was formally launched today. Macquarie has structured the fund as two separate trusts in order to facilitate the participation of the seven Mexican pensions.

The pension has investments in its pipeline that could bring its total commitments to the asset class to $1bn or more by early 2010. CalPERS has already invested $700m to the asset class.