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A subsidiary of the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA), the UAE's sovereign wealth fund, invested $590 million in Kotak Investment Advisors Ltd. (KIAL), an Indian alternate assets investor, on Monday to set up a real-estate investment platform.
According to reports in the Indian media, the fund, which is based in Gift City in Gujarat, will invest in office assets in the top six property markets: Mumbai, Bangalore, Delhi-NCR, Pune, Hyderabad and Chennai.
With this investment, KIAL, a part of Kotak Mahindra Bank, has raised, managed or advised more than $2.8 billion under its real-estate fund series.
Kotak Realty Fund's chief executive Vikas Chimakurthy, said: "Strong demand for offshoring, return to office increasing, growth of the services industry and Indian economy has seen substantial scope for creating a portfolio of quality office assets."
“This new platform will focus on opportunities associated with long-term demand for Indian office space, which is being driven by global organisations seeking to capitalise on the country’s skilled workforce. It also presents the opportunity to extend our relationship with Kotak, with whom we have successfully invested over a number of years,” said Mohamed AlQubaisi, Executive Director of the Real Estate Department at ADIA.
This is not the first time ADIA has partnered with Kotak. In 2019, a subsidiary of ADIA invested $500 million in Kotak's Special Situations Fund, which targeted a range of non-performing loan (NPL) opportunities in India.
KIAL, which was set up in 2005, has raised, advised or managed $5.12 billion across different verticals including private equity funds, real estate funds, infrastructure funds, special situations fund etc:-
(Writing by Seban Scaria seban.scaria@lseg.com; editing by Brinda Darasha)