NewQuest Capital Partners, a private equity firm focusing on emerging markets, has marked the final close of its third secondaries fund 'NewQuest Asia Fund III, LP' at over $540 million.
The company received the funding from a diverse group of pension funds, sovereign funds, insurers and financial institutions based in Asia, North America, Europe and the Middle East. The fund had an original upper
limit of $520 million, which was increased due to the strong demand.
NewQuest Asia Fund III will focus on minority and control transactions worth $25 million to $75 million per company, and $50 million to $250 million for portfolio acquisitions.
NewQuest Asia Fund II, LP, had a final close in July 2014 with commitments of $326 million through two vehicles.
Given many of Fund III’s investors are large institutions, NewQuest can also participate in large-sized transactions when opportunities arise.
"In addition to providing bespoke liquidity solutions to investors, NewQuest will assist them in achieving their long-term strategic objectives," said Darren Massara, managing partner of NewQuest.
The announcement of final close of Fund III follows the appointment of Daizong Wang in March this year as partner at NewQuest.
Daizong joins NewQuest from CVC Capital Partners. He had previously worked with 3i Group and Goldman Sachs, among others. He will be heading NewQuest’s Beijing office, slated to open later this year.
Meanwhile, NewQuest is looking to augment its presence in India with its Mumbai office expected to be opened by the end of 2016.
NewQuest invests in infrastructure-related sectors including power, roads, construction and engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) along with logistics. The PE firm has largely restricted itself to minority transactions in the past but may look at control deals more seriously this time around.
The firm specialises in providing bespoke liquidity solutions to private equity investors with investments in emerging Asia, particularly China, India and Southeast Asia.
Since inception, NewQuest has acquired stakes in over 40 companies through both single asset and portfolio transactions. NewQuest currently manages three funds with aggregate capital commitments of over $1.2 billion.
In October 2015, UK-based private equity fund Actis had agreed to sell its seven-year-old investment in NSE to NewQuest for Rs 178 crore.
In March 2015, NewQuest had invested in Bangalore-based Ujjivan Financial Services Pvt Ltd, one of leading microfinance institutions in the country, along with CX Partners, CDC and Bajaj Holdings. Existing investors IFC and Elevar Equity had also participated in the investment round worth $96 million (Rs 600 crore then).
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