이 기사는 2021년 08월 04일 08:05 thebell 에 표출된 기사입니다.

Macquarie Group’s fifth South Korean infrastructure fund is nearing its fundraising target of up to 700 billion won ($608.4 million), industry sources said on Monday.

Macquarie Korea Opportunities Fund (MKOF) V, which is in the process of raising capital from investors, has secured more than 90% of its fundraising target, according to sources. The final closing of the fund is scheduled for November this year.

Macquarie started to market the fund to institutional investors last year. The new fund has the National Pension Service as an anchor investor, securing 160 billion won from the country’s state pension scheme in June last year. Other large investors in the fund include Scientists and Engineers Mutual-aid Association.

Macquarie’s client solutions group, which was created last year, has led the latest fundraising effort, alongside Macquarie Korea Opportunities Management’s chief executive officer Eric Kim and managing director Soo-jin Lee.

Macquarie last year raised about 400 billion won for its co-investment fund, exceeding its 350 billion won fundraising target. This fund was used to invest in a minority stake in IT service provider LG CNS. The final closing of the new fund this year will bring the firm’s total fundraising for the last two years to nearly 1 trillion won.

The new fund’s predecessors were successful. MKOF III, which closed at 745 billion won in 2014, invested in several infrastructure assets including Daejeon Cogeneration Plant, oil storage terminal Taeyoung Horizon Korea and waste management companies Koentec, Clenco and Saehan Environment. Earlier this year, Macquarie successfully exited its investments in Clenco and Saehan Environment by selling them to SK Ecoplant.

The 2010-vintage MKOF II produced an internal rate of return of 14.5%. Its portfolio companies included five waste management service providers, of which four were acquired by a consortium of Dongbu Corp and Echo Prime PE and the remaining one was sold to Affirma Capital in 2018.

Macquarie is expected to further step up its infrastructure investment in South Korea after the closing of its fifth fund. One of the firm’s most notable deals in the country is the 3 trillion won acquisition of security company ADT Caps in 2018. MKOF III and MKOF IV were used to fund the deal. (Reporting by Seon-young Kim)