News: Actis to set up $300 m realty fund

(BL 31/01/2007) New Delhi - The UK-based private equity firm Actis has drawn out plans to ramp up its investments in India. The private equity firm is in the process of setting up a separate $ 200-300 million real estate fund, Donald Peck, Managing Partner, Actis, said. It is also planning to set up a new fund for investing in the Indian market, he added without disclosing further details.

Actis has till now been investing in India from two separate funds estimated at about $475 million. According to sources, the new fund would be substantially larger than the previous one and combined with the realty fund may take the total quantum of funds, allocated for India by the private equity firm, to close to a billion dollars.

In talks

Speaking on the realty fund, Peck said that the firm is looking to invest in the real estate sector quite actively and is in talks with a couple of players for making investments. "A new team has been set up to look at realty investments. Further, the investors in the realty fund are also different," Peck said.

Recently, Chanakya Chakravarti, Joint Managing Director of Cushman & Wakefield, joined Actis to manage the private equity firm's real estate fund.