Private equity firm Toro Finserve LLP, which is floated by investment and healthcare industry veteran Kapil Khandelwal, is raising its debut healthcare real estate fund, the company said in a statement.
The $500-million India Healthcare Opportunities Fund (IHOF) includes an additional leverage of $250 million, the statement added.
The fund, registered as SEBI Alternative Investment Fund under Category II, has received commitments of $110 million from Indian state governments, ultra high-net-worth individuals, and fund-of-funds from abroad, it said. The formal roadshow for the fund-raising will begin from June or July.
The fund is also in discussions with various banks and financial institutions for lease rental discounting (LRD) and leverage and distribution, it added.
IHOF will invest in stabilised assets such as hospitals, diagnostic centres, rehab facilities and assisted living facilities set up by stablished healthcare operators in Tier I and II cities.
"Our fund expects to create and invest in healthcare infrastructure where institutional investments in the space have been shy and selective around a few chains of private hospitals so far," Khandelwal, managing partner at Toro Finserve, said.
The fund is currently evaluating deals worth $200 million with Indian hospital chains, assisted living and diagnostic centres to issue term sheets, he added.
Khandelwal also said the fund has built a consortium of partners to help reduce the time to market and operating costs for the healthcare facilities it invests in. The fund aims to become India’s first healthcare Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) and list its fund in four to five years on Indian or Singapore stock exchanges.
Khandelwal said the team has worked on over $42 billion of real estate transactions and $2 billion of healthcare transactions globally.
The fund's advisory committee members include Arvind Lal, chairman of Dr. Lal PathLabs, and Kewal Handa, former managing director of Pfizer India.
Healthcare has been attracting a lot of investments in the past few years, and a number of healthcare-focused funds, including Quadria Capital and India Life Sciences Fund II, have emerged.
Fundraising by PE firms
A number of private equity firms have successfully closed their fundraising process in the past months while some are on the road.
Last week, International Finance Corporation (IFC) said private equity firm Kedaara Capital Advisors Ltd was raising its second fund.
Earlier this year, homegrown PE firm ChrysCapital Management Co overshot its $600-million target for its seventh fund.
Last year, Multiples Alternate Asset Management Pvt. Ltd wrapped up the fundraising process for its second fund to raise the fifth-largest sector-agnostic private equity investment corpus ever raised for India.
In December, Fairfax India Holding Corporation, part of India-born Canadian billionaire Prem Watsa’s Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd, raised $500 million.
