MUMBAI: Bahrain’s alternative asset manager Investcorp, which entered the Indian market last year through the acquisition of the private equity (PE) and real estate funds businesses of IDFC Alternatives Ltd, has started raising its maiden fund for the Indian market, according to three people aware of the development.
“The firm has started raising $250-300 million for a new real estate fund and is raising an additional $100 million in a follow-on round for the existing PE fund that it bought from IDFC Alternatives," said one of the people mentioned above, requesting anonymity.
Investcorp manages about $22.5 billion of assets across PE, real estate, special situations and credit. It has offices in New York, London, Bahrain, Abu Dhabi, Doha, Riyadh, and Singapore.
Mint had reported in May 2018 that Investcorp was buying the PE and real estate lending businesses of IDFC Alternatives. The sale was part of the restructuring of the IDFC Group, which also saw the sale of the infrastructure investment arm of IDFC Alternatives to Global Infrastructure Partners, a US-based infrastructure investor .
IDFC Alternatives last launched a real estate fund in 2016, its third, raising ₹760 crore from domestic investors. Its first fund, IDFC Proprietary Office Fund, of ₹700 crore had been raised in 2011-12. In 2014, it had raised the ₹750 crore IDFC Real Estate Yield Fund.
On the PE side, IDFC Alternatives manages four funds with investments in companies such as Parag Milk Foods Ltd, Staragri Warehousing and Collateral Management Ltd, and GMR Energy Ltd.
“Investcorp is tapping its existing Lp (limited partners—investors in a PE fund) base in the Gulf region and other geographies for the fundraise," said another person mentioned above, also requesting anonymity.
Investcorp did not comment on Mint’s queries on its India fundraise plans.
The initial focus in India will be on the PE and real estate businesses, given the inherent strength of IDFC Alternatives in these areas, Investcorp co-CEO Rishi Kapoor had said in an interaction in December.
“The platform (IDFC Alternatives) has deep-rooted experience around PE and real estate. Within PE in particular, they have got capability around high-growth consumption sectors, which we like a lot. Within real estate, they have done well on real estate backed lending. Our first order of business is going to be to back those two groups in the areas where they have demonstrated core competence and once we have optimized those we will get into adjacencies," he had said.
