Infravia sells minority stakes in Nordic energy distribution firm

InfraVia Capital Partners has agreed to sell a 25% stake of Aurora Infrastructure to funds managed by Access Capital Partners and Pantheon Ventures.

With approximately 5,000 GWh of electricity distributed each year to industrial clients, 6 % of Finland’s total electricity consumption, Aurora is a prominent player in the Nordic distribution market.

The comapny focuses on providing highly reliable distribution to critical industrial sites such as Röyttä in Tornio (Finland) where it serves Outokumpu’s manufacturing units and Kilpilahti near Porvoo (Finland) where it distributes electricity to the largest chemical concentration in the Nordics, with Neste and Borealis amongst its largest customers.

Aurora was created as a regional platform by InfraVia in 2015 following the successful transition at both Röyttä Industrial Grid (RIG) and Kilpilahti Electricity Distribution (KED) that were respectively acquired in December 2013 and December 2014.

Vincent Levita, Founder and CEO of InfraVia Capital Partners, stated:

“Having Access and Pantheon on board in Aurora illustrates our approach in offering coinvestment opportunities to likeminded investors in key portfolio companies. This transaction will also secure Aurora’s access to further capital in order to purse its development strategy in acquiring further industrial networks in the Nordic region.”

Manish Pandey, Partner Infrastructure at Access Capital Partners, commented:

“We see Finland as an attractive market for private investments in infrastructure. Finnish electricity distribution market in particular benefits from sound dynamics and Aurora assets display the features that we are targeting for our investments. We are pleased with the work done by InfraVia with respect to asset integration and creation of Aurora platform subsequent to the acquisitions of RIG and KED assets in 2013 and 2014. We look forward to working together in the management of the current assets and to further growing this business.”

Andrea Echberg, Partner and Head of European Infrastructure Investments at Pantheon, added:

“We are delighted to have secured this co-investment opportunity, alongside InfraVia, which in our view offers the potential for strong, stable cash yield and growth.”