New York based Veda Asset Management is raising a $500 million infrastructure fund to invest in fully operational projects in India, reports Alternative Investment. The fund will make 10-16 investments over the next five years with the average investment between $30 to 50 million.
The company project an IRR of 21-25%. Minimum investment for institutions will be $10 million and it will be $5 million for high net worth individuals.
Commenting on why the fund will not be deployed for early stage investing, Ridaa Murad, founder, Veda, said that it contains a lot of risks and delays.
Murad started the firm after working in Bear Sterns’ equity product group in 2003. He is currently approaching pension, foundation, endowment, family office and insurence companies to raise to raise the fund.
While there are several private equity firms investing in India's infrastructure space, most of them focus on companies and not on projects. There is only one India-dedicated fund which invests in projects - IDFC Project Equity - which is backed by Citigroup and managed to raise around $1 billion last year. There are international funds like $4 billion Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Partners also eyeing the Indian infrastructure projects.
