The Inspire Partnership consortium, comprising Babcock & Brown spinout Amber Infrastructure and developer Shepherd Construction, have announced financial close of the Liverpool Library private finance initiative. The project includes £51m of debt from Nationwide and Helaba.
The $242 billion National Pension Service of Korea is planning to grow its alternative assets allocation to more than 10 percent of total assets in 2014. The allocation represents a meteoric rise on the 3.8 percent target allocation set in 2008.
The Deutsche Bank-sponsored fund has acquired an 80% stake in Autovia del Camino from Global Via, Caja Navarra and NEC.
AXA Private Equity, the French private equity and infrastructure investor, has paid €67m for a 50% stake in Autopista Trados 45, manager of a stretch of the M-45 highway in Madrid. The sale is part of a strategy by seller Cintra to realise proceeds from mature assets.
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and World Bank unit the IFC have jointly raised €200m from a group of eight commercial banks in support of Russia’s Pulkovo airport PPP, which will see the reconstruction and expansion of the St Petersburg airport.
GCP Infrastructure Investments, a new infrastructure debt vehicle set up by fund manager Gravis Capital Partners, has raised £40m from an initial public offering on the London Stock Exchange. The fund aims to provide subordinated debt to UK private finance initiative projects.
The global head of Clifford Chance’s private funds group, Jason Glover, will establish a UK practice for Simpson Thacher & Bartlett.
The Canadian private equity investors are at ‘advanced’ stages of due diligence for what would be the largest UK LBO this year.
Groupe Eurotunnel, the owner of the Channel Tunnel rail link between England and France, has confirmed it is part of a ‘British consortium’ bidding for High Speed 1, the UK’s only high-speed rail line, which runs from London’s St Pancras station to the Tunnel.
A new report predicts that a brief revival in the UK construction sector will be swiftly reversed by the coalition government’s austerity measures. It says that ‘many major infrastructure projects’ could be threatened and that the construction sector is likely to see a contraction for 2010 as a whole.
Matthew Hudson, formerly of SJ Berwin and Coller Capital, has founded a law firm which will charge fees based on clients’ success rather than billable hours.
The transportation of natural gas has become a major theme in the infrastructure investment universe, as highlighted by the contribution made by two major pipeline projects to the supremacy of energy in InfrastructureInvestor Assets’ sector-focused league table for the second quarter.
The UK rolling stock company has successfully issued a £300m 10-year ‘bullet’ bond and a £500m 25-year amortising bond as part of its debt refinancing programme.
Russia has risen to the top of InfrastructureInvestor Assets’ league table with $12bn of deals closed during the second quarter of 2010 including Nord Stream, Pulkovo Airport and two road concessions.
French rail agency RFF has officially awarded a €7.8bn contract to build and operate a 300-kilometre high-speed rail line connecting the western cities of Tours and Bordeaux.