ICICI To Launch Infrastructure Fund

India''s ICICI Bank plans to launch a US$2 billion infrastructure fund to invest in ports, power and aviation projects, the Financial Times reports. The bank anticipates that Indian companies will invest about US$250 billion in infrastructure throughout the next three years. We already play a major role as term lenders in all the projects, said Chanda Kochhar, deputy managing director of ICICI. We feel that there is also a large amount of equity opportunity that we can take care of through the fund. Aside from domestic investors, foreign operators including Citigroup, Blackstone and 3i are starting India infrastructure funds. The government predicts the country will need US$470 billion of investment in the area in the next five years.