Fundraising

First close for €1bn InfraMed fund

The fund, sponsored by a number of European and North African banks, has reached first close on €385m. InfraMed is targeting €1bn to invest primarily in greenfield infrastructure in the southern and eastern Mediterranean region.

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A number of European and North African banks have launched the InfraMed Infrastructure fund with a first close of €385 million.

Egypt: getting at least
10% of InfraMed's funds
France’s Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations (CDC), Morocco’s Caisse de Dépôt et de Gestion (CDG), Italy’s Cassa Depositi e Prestiti (CDP), the European Investment Bank (EIB) and Egypt’s EFG Hermes are sponsoring the fund.  CDC and CDP are each contributing €150 million, the EIB is putting in €50 million and CDG and EFG Hermes are each providing €20 million and €15 million respectively to the fund, the sponsors said in a statement.

InfraMed is targeting a final close of €1 billion and is aiming to primarily invest in greenfield projects across the southern and eastern Mediterranean region covering transportation, energy and urban infrastructure, the vehicle said in a statement. The fund stresses it will look to hold “investments over a longer term than traditional private equity infrastructure funds […] being rooted in a philosophy of long term economic return”.

The fund will allocate at least 20 percent of its resources to Morocco and Egypt. In addition, sponsors CDG and EFG Hermes have agreed to raise two local infrastructure funds to invest alongside InfraMed in their respective countries.

Frederic Ottavy, of bilateral French institution Agence Française de Développement, has been appointed as InfraMed’s chief executive.

The president of Italy’s CDP, Franco Bassanini, has been appointed as InfraMed’s chairman with the chief executives of CDC, Augustin de Romanet, and CDG, Anass Houir Alami, appointed as the fund’s vice-chairmen. Rachid Mohammed Rachid, Egypt’s minister of trade and industry, will serve as chairman of the strategic board, which will be responsible for advising the fund.

InfraMed will be incorporated under French law and will contribute to French president Nicolas Sarkozy’s Union for the Mediterranean treaty. The agreement was signed in July 2008 between all the European Union member states and several non-EU countries bordering the Mediterranean sea to promote closer cooperation in several areas, including trade and justice.