Infrastructure and private equity investment manager Foresight Group has promoted Minal Patel, Ricardo Pineiro and Matt Smith to partner as of 1 January 2017.
The promotions follow continued expansion in the group during 2016.
Staff numbers increased by 21 per cent to more than 150 as Foresight opened two new offices during the year, while assets under management increased by 28 per cent to GBP2.3 billion.
Foresight opened a new office in Sydney, Australia to support the deployment of the AUD100 million Australian Bioenergy Fund and to explore opportunities in the Solar sector. In the UK the deployment of the Recycling and Waste (RAW) Fund cornerstoned by the UK Green Investment Bank (GIB) has continued with nine new investments into on-farm anaerobic digestion projects from the fund in 2016, many supporting the agricultural industry in Northern Ireland.
Foresight has continued to expand its portfolio of solar power plants in the UK and funds managed by Foresight now own 76 operational solar plants with an enterprise value in excess of GBP1.5 billion and a generating capacity of 740MW.
In Italy, the Foresight and VEI Green joint venture, ForVEI, completed a EUR180 million refinancing package, which will support the creation of a 90MW utility scale platform owned, managed and operated by ForVEI.
In December, Foresight Metering Limited, the second generation meter asset provider (MAP) launched in early 2016, completed the acquisition of 100 per cent of the share capital of Utility Funding, which owns and rents a portfolio in excess of 150,000 advanced and smart meters to some 53 energy suppliers of electricity and gas across the UK. Tom Thorp formerly managing director of Foresight Metering has been appointed chief executive officer of the company.
The promotions of Patel (bioenergy), Piñeiro (UK solar) and Smith (private equity) from director to partner will add strength and depth to the senior management of Foresight Group, which now numbers 15 Partners.
Bernard Fairman, chairman of Foresight, says: “As our business continues its rapid expansion, we will continue to promote regularly to add Partners who are able to contribute significant value add to the business. Matt, Minal and Ricardo have already made terrific contributions to their respective areas of focus, and we are delighted to welcome them formally into the partnership, where I am confident they will all continue to help us in achieving our aims.”
