Gaw Capital raises record US$2.2bn for Asia real estate fund

Hong Kong-based Gaw Capital Partners has raised US$2.2bn in the final closing of its Gateway Real Estate Fund VI, marking the firm’s largest fund to date.

Gaw Capital also secured a sidecar co-investment commitment of up to US$800m.

The fund received commitments from sovereign wealth funds, endowments, pension funds and other institutional investors, with 46% from Europe, 37% from Asia and 17% from North America.

“With an integrated business model, investors in fund VI will enjoy the benefits of our in-house asset management operating platforms that span the retail, commercial, residential, hospitality, industrial and data centre sectors,” said Kenneth Gaw, managing principal and president of Gaw Capital Partners.

The fund will target assets mainly in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Hong Kong and other cities across Greater China, with selected exposure to Japan, Vietnam, South Korea, Singapore, Southeast Asia and Australia.

The firm said the fund will also consider operating thematic platforms and pre-IPO real estate companies looking for strategic capital to capitalise on market trends.

“Our increased expansion into thematic platforms such as data centres, healthcare and education-related real estate platforms are very welcomed by our investors,” said Christina Gaw, managing principal and head of capital markets at Gaw Capital.

“These are followed by our successful execution in other existing thematic portfolios such as retail outlet malls and logistics.”

Fund VI has already made several investments, including residential buildings in Japan, IDC platforms in China, retirement villages in Australia, and an office building in Singapore.

Last month, Gaw Capital teamed up with data centre specialist Centrin Data to establish and manage a portfolio of hyper-scale data centres in China.

The fund also purchased a portfolio of 12 shopping centres in Hong Kong from Link REIT for US$1.53bn in December last year, as well as acquiring four office buildings in Shanghai from China Resources Capital Management in January.

Gaw Capital has US$23bn in assets under management.

Original Source