Kotak Alternate Assets, managed by Kotak Investment Advisors Limited (KIAL) on Wednesday announced its plans to launch a Rs 1,000-crore private credit fund under the alternative investment fund (AIF) category II, with a greenshoe option to raise another Rs 1,000 crore.
The private credit fund will have a diversified investment universe and be sector-agnostic. It will focus on the performing credit space, providing debt to growth-oriented companies with established business models in the mid-market space to secure mid-to-high teen returns, a statement by KIAL said.
KIAL has appointed former KKR executive Niraj Karia to lead this new private credit vertical. Karia has previously worked as an executive director at Kotak Investment Banking for over 13 years before moving to US-based private equity player KKR & Co in 2018.
“It’s homecoming for Niraj (Karia) who will help us build the private credit business at KIAL. He will add strength & depth to future plans and the objective of building scale to our platform. The effort to raise a private credit fund comes at an opportune time, coinciding with the evolving private credit ecosystem and will help increase our footprint in the credit investment space by making secured credit investments in mid-sized businesses while generating returns for our investors,” said S Sriniwasan, managing director, KIAL.
Recently KIAL also announced that it will also be raising a strategic situation fund as part of its second and larger fund, bringing in newer institutional investors. It plans to mark the first close of this second new fund by September–October this year.
Several homegrown players such as ICICI Venture, True North, IIFL Wealth and Asset Management, InCred Capital, Xander Group-backed Sanctum Wealth Pvt. Ltd and Certus Capital have expressed plans to set up funds under the private credit segment.
Last year, VCCircle reported that Bahrain-based Investcorp is planning to launch a second India-focused $400 million fund.
Part of the billionaire Uday Kotak-owned Kotak Mahindra Bank, KIAL was set up in 2005 and since then has managed/advised/raised $5.1 billion across different asset classes including private equity funds, real estate funds, infrastructure funds, special situations fund, listed strategies and investment advisory.
