A consortium of Canadian and Kuwaiti investors has agreed to buy a minority stake in Thames Water, a U.K. water and wastewater company, from funds managed by Macquarie Infrastructure & Real Assets. No financial details were disclosed. The deal is the latest high-profile acquisition of U.K. infrastructure by overseas investors.
Canadian pension fund investor Borealis Infrastructure, infrastructure investment manager for OMERS, the pension plan for Ontario’s municipal employees, and Wren House Infrastructure Management, the infrastructure investing arm of the Kuwait Investment Authority, are buying a 26 percent stake in Kemble Water Holdings, the holding company of Thames Water.
Macquarie owned the stake in the United Kingdom’s largest water firm for 11 years. Macquarie, in a separate statement, said its Macquarie European Infrastructure Fund 2, which held most of the stake, was divesting as it approaches maturity, and the deal would end the group’s involvement with Thames Water.
Thames Water is the United Kingdom’s largest water and wastewater services provider, with 15 million customers across London, the Thames Valley and surrounding areas. It supplies 2.6 billion liters of drinking water per day.