National Investment and Infrastructure and Fund Ltd. (NIFF) will acquire two major toll-way roads from Essel, this is first of its effort to build a Road and Highways portfolio, once acquired, these toll-ways will be managed by Aathang Infrastructure, said NIIF in a press release on November 2.
NIFF will acquire Essel Devanahalli toll-way which is part of NH44, a 22 Km, six lane highway connecting Bangalore to Devanahalli airport, and Essel Dichpally in Telangana state, a 60 Km four lane highway, which lies between two industrial hubs, Hyderabad and Nagpur, and serves commercial traffic.
“NIIF is pleased to announce its first investment in the roads sector. Athaang will invest in strategic assets and develop a portfolio including mature operational assets, annuities/hybrid annuities, large size expressways and highways with greenfield and brownfield expansion requirements. Athaang’s objective is to emerge as the preferred partner for stakeholders in the Indian roads sector.” Said Vinod Giri, Managing Partner, NIIF.
Giri also said, NIIF along with co-investors aspire to invest $1 billion of equity capital in the next five years, Indian road sector offers a strong pipeline for investments through acquisition of operational assets, including annuity/hybrid annuity projects by Indian developers and the government’s asset monetisation plan, reported Bloomberg Quint.
NIFF Limited is an investment platform, for Indian and international investors, backed by government of India, master fund backed by Indian government, and other sovereign wealth funds and Canadian pension firms.
As of now NIFF manages $ 4.3 billion worth of equity capital across its Master Fund, Funds of Fund and Strategic Opportunities Fund.
NIFF invests in private equity, Infrastructure and other diverse sectors, master funds are utilised in acquiring infrastructure and related acquisitions.
Master funds are utilised in The above mentioned two toll-way acquisition were done through its Master Fund.