Operational Excellence Awards 2015: submissions wanted!

Nothing is more guaranteed to rile infrastructure fund managers than the observation occasionally made that the asset class is essentially bond-like: one in which passive investors can effectively afford to sit back with their feet up and wait for dividends to come rolling in once the investment has been made.

Infrastructure Investor has by now hosted a sufficient number of asset management roundtables to have compiled a great deal of evidence to the contrary. Even at the supposed lower risk, lower return end of the infrastructure spectrum, we have learnt of a great many operational techniques that can make a considerable difference to the investment outcome.

At the other end of the spectrum, where private equity-style strategies prevail, reputations are entirely won or lost on an ability to bring positive change to the assets and businesses that fund managers or direct investors own or part-own.

In recognition of this – and with a sense that the spadework of investors too often goes unappreciated – we are launching our first-ever Operational Excellence Awards. Such awards have been successfully run previously by our sister title Private Equity International. Now, they are rightly being applied to this asset class as well.

You will find by clicking HERE to make your submissions that we are asking for evidence of specific types of value add, whilst also giving you the opportunity to build a case in your own words as to why a particular investment deserves the plaudits. You will also find that we are breaking down the submissions into four different deal size categories to make sure all parts of the market are well represented.

One final point to note (which you will find stated on the forms): submissions must relate to investments which have been at least partially realised since 1 June 2014.

We look forward with anticipation to reading about the asset class’s success stories!