Mitsui & Co., the Tokyo-based trading giant, will take a 20% stake in Melbourne, Australia-based infrastructure debt boutique Westbourne Capital, both companies announced Monday.
Terms of the deal weren’t disclosed.
Westbourne Capital, launched in 2008 by a group of executives from Melbourne-based infrastructure firm Hastings Funds Management, said in a news release that the firm has attracted commitments of “$4 billion from 24 global institutional clients, including sovereign wealth funds, pension funds and the insurance sector.”
The news release said Mitsui will subscribe to new shares that will equate to a 20% stake in the company, with an option to increase its stake by another 10% over the next three to five years.
A Mitsui news release said the firm will become “the first Japanese company to participate in a funds management business specializing in infrastructure debt,” a segment of the investment universe attracting a growing number of institutional investors in Japan on account of its “stable and predictable returns.”
Japan Alternative Investment Co., a Tokyo-based subsidiary of Mitsui launched in 2001 to market a variety of alternative strategies, will market Westbourne’s infrastructure debt funds as well to Japanese investors, the Mitsui news release said.
