The three pension funds PKA, Pension Danmark, and Lægernes Pension have joined forces with A.P. Moller Holding (APM Holding) to establish a new fund under the name Afrika Infrastruktur Fond (Africa Infrastructure Fund) with a budget of USD 550 million injected by the investors.

The new fund will be managed by A.P. Moller Capital (APM Capital), a company under APM Holding. APM Capital's executive team consists of the four partners Kim Fejfer, Lars Reno Jakobsen, Jens Thomassen, and Joe Nicklaus Nielsen.

"We are very pleased with the significant support from the Danish pension funds and A.P. Moller Holding. Together, we will build and operate infrastructure business in Africa to support sustainable development and improvements in living standards across the continent. We will combine the best from industry in terms of project management and operational capabilities with the best from private equity in terms of agility and focus" says Fejfer, Managing Partner and CEO of APM Capital, in a press release about the new fund.

Three out of four partners from the Maersk Group

Of the four APM Capital executives, three come from the Maersk Group. Fejfer most recently served as CEO of APM Terminals. Jakobsen has since 2012 been senior vice president for the Maersk Group in Africa, and Nielsen has been with Maersk for 18 years, most recently as head of APM Terminals' global investment activities.

Only Thomassen of the four has not previously worked for Maersk. He instead comes from company Denham Capital, where he headed investments in Africa in energy.

APM Holding is headed by CEO Robert Mærsk Uggla, who previously served as chief executive of Svitzer before he was in 2016 tapped to head the holding company, which manages assets totaling USD 20 billion.

He says the following about the fund and its ten-year investment perspective:

"A.P. Moller Holding was established to build value creating businesses that have a positive impact on society. Africa, with a working-age population likely to reach more than one billion people in the next decades, has a pressing requirement for more investments in infrastructure. In this respect, we are delighted to have established a new promising company in our portfolio with a strong team, who hold the right capabilities and experience to manage infrastructure investments in emerging markets."

Contributes to UN global sustainability goals

The new Africa fund's work will have a beneficial impact on a larger scale, says Torben Möger Petersen, CEO of Pension Danmark.

"We are delighted to be among the seed investors in Africa Infrastructure Fund I. We see this as a unique opportunity to invest in a region with high economic growth and attractive investment opportunities alongside a partner, A. P. Moller Capital, that has extensive investment experience combined with a strong network and a promising pipeline of potential investment projects. The fund is a good example of how private capital can be mobilized on large scale to implement the UN's Sustainable Development Goals," he says in the press release.

English Edit: Daniel Logan Berg-Munch

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