MANAMA, 20 February 2007 — Instrata Capital B.S.C. (c), a newly formed Bahrain-based investment management company, on Sunday announced that it has been granted an investment firm license by the Central Bank of Bahrain (CBB).
Instrata Capital will identify, structure and manage investment products that are unique within the region. While maintaining a broad view of investment opportunities in the GCC and MENA, Instrata Capital will focus initially on private equity investment in sectors including utilities, transportation, and social and industrial infrastructure. Within the first three years of operation, Instrata Capital expects to have approximately $1.0 billion of funds under management invested in a portfolio of regional companies and projects.
The region’s infrastructure sector is among the fastest growing, with the GCC countries alone projected to spend over $545 billion on infrastructure development over the next ten years. Such rapid development is being facilitated by high fiscal surpluses, the corporate investment required for the expansion of many industrial and processing companies, as well as the need for governments to meet the demands of the region’s fast growing population for access to a broad range of services. These factors, coupled with increasing opportunities for private sector participation in infrastructure development, make this a time of unprecedented opportunity for regional and international companies as well as privately managed infrastructure projects in which Instrata Capital intends to invest.