GI Partners nears target, eyes cap on debut digital infrastructure fund

In November, Washington State Investment Board committed $175m to the fund, with an additional $75m of co-investment capital.

San Francisco-based GI Partners collected around $1.2 billion for its debut digital infrastructure fund that will invest in assets like data centres, a person with knowledge of the fund told sister title Buyouts.

GI Partners is targeting $1.25 billion with a $1.5 billion hard cap for GI Data Infrastructure Fund. In November, Washington State Investment Board committed $175 million to the fund, with an additional $75 million of co-investment capital.

As part of the development of the strategy, the firm last year hired Mark Prybutok as a managing director. Prybutok joined from Alinda Capital, where he led the firm’s telecom infrastructure strategy. The strategy also is led by former Equinix CEO Steve Smith, who GI hired last year, the source said.

Park Hill Group is working as placement agent on the fundraising.

Digital infrastructure generally refers to data centres, telecommunication towers and fibre wiring. GI began talking to investors about the fund in 2018, sources told Buyouts at the time.

The move by GI Partners mirrors the steps taken by real estate investment group Colony Capital, which last year closed a $4.05 billion digital infrastructure fund after teaming up with Digital Bridge to establish Digital Colony. Last July, Colony Capital bought Digital Bridge for $325 million.

Traditionally a private equity and real estate manager, GI closed its fifth private equity fund on $2.7 billion in November 2017, targeting investments in IT infrastructure, healthcare, software and services. The firm closed Fund IV on $2 billion in 2014.

Led by executive managing director and founder Rick Magnuson, GI Partners invests in tech, media and telecom, healthcare, retail and leisure and business and financial services.

GI has about $15.3 billion of discretionary and non-discretionary assets under management, according to the firm’s Form ADV.