The government unblocked the funding – which will be used to finance land acquisition and 26.5 years of availability payments – after the project achieved savings of £30m. The new bridge over the river Mersey will cost £600m to build.
A club of 12 banks is providing a seven-year loan to fund the team’s recent acquisition of GDF Suez’s Italian gas grid and re-leverage two other local gas grids bought over the last two years. AXA/F2i is now Italy’s second-largest gas distributor.
The Australian developer is recycling three operational UK public-private partnerships for £30m to the Lend Lease UK Infrastructure Fund – a joint venture with PGGM. Roughly half of the £220m fund is already invested.
Michiel Boersma, a former chief executive of Dutch utility Essent, has become the fourth senior advisor to First State’s European unlisted infrastructure investments team, which has raised close to €600m for the its debut fund.
‘The strong credit quality of the asset class and resilient contractual structures’ has helped European public-private partnerships withstand the financial crisis well. But deteriorating public finances, ongoing austerity and a constrained bank market pose risks for the industry.
The French fund manager is due to raise €1 billion by the end of November, with a further big-ticket commitment expected before the year is out. The potential sale of AXA Private Equity, expected to be concluded in November, might cause some delays to fundraising though.
The proceeds from the new fundraising will be used to buy nine operational PPP projects from John Laing, increase a stake in an existing project, and reduce the fund’s debt. The fund is also in negotiations to acquire a ‘small portfolio of third-party social infrastructure assets’.
The investment adviser – which focuses on private equity, real estate and infrastructure – has lured two new recruits, as well as promoting Joseph Chang to head up its Hong Kong office.
Nine members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations have contributed $335m to a fund that will finance major infrastructure projects in the region. The Asian Development Bank is committing $150m to the vehicle.
Spanish developer ACS has sold 50% of Tunel San Cristobal and 46.5% of Vespucio Norte to the Toronto-based investor. The developer is also looking for buyers for its 100% stake in Florida’s €1.2bn I-595 highway.
As an asset class, infrastructure may one day be as big as real estate – assuming the latter doesn’t annex much of the former
BBVA and KfW IPEX are providing €120m of debt to help fund the refurbishment, operation and maintenance of 46.5km of Germany’s A9 highway. Vinci and BAM PPP will contribute €12m in equity with the German government providing the €88m balance.
Estradas de Portugal, which doles out the availability payments for Portugal’s road PPPs, may not be able to finance itself starting in 2013. The agency’s bank debt is set to rise to €4.2bn by 2015 and since most of it is short-term, there is a chance the agency won’t be able to refinance.
The UK PFI developer and investor has reached its target of £150m for its second core infrastructure fund – and has now set a new target of £250m by the end of this year.
The EU-focused infrastructure fund manager is in the race to build, operate and maintain a 49km stretch of the A66 highway alongside Spanish companies FCC, Sacyr and COMSA. Five other teams, one of which includes Meridiam, are also bidding for the highway.