ARM-Harith Infrastructure Investments Limited (ARM-Harith), a pan-African private equity fund manager focused on sustainable energy and infrastructure, has announced the first close of its climate transition successor fund at approximately $76 million.
The fund, which targets a final close of $200 million, is designed to mobilise African institutional capital and accelerate investments in energy transition and climate-resilient infrastructure projects across Sub-Saharan Africa.
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According to a statement issued by the company on Monday and shared with PREMIUM TIMES, the fund is the first integrated multi-currency blended finance platform created specifically for African institutional investors, combining both United States dollar and local currency investments within a single infrastructure equity fund structure.
ARM-Harith said the model was developed to address a longstanding challenge in African infrastructure financing — the mismatch between foreign currency-denominated investment vehicles and the local currency revenues generated by infrastructure assets.
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The firm explained that integrating local and hard-currency capital within the same platform would help reduce currency risks at the project level while enabling greater participation by domestic institutional investors, particularly pension funds. International investors, it noted, would still retain exposure to dollar-denominated investments.
The first close was supported by a combined $20 million in catalytic capital from FSD Africa Investments (FSDAi) and the African Development Bank (AfDB) through its Sustainable Energy Fund for Africa (SEFA).
ARM-Harith said the funding would help de-risk investments for pension funds and other institutional investors while supporting efforts to scale domestic capital mobilisation for infrastructure development across Africa.
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The fund will invest in infrastructure projects that deliver climate resilience, economic impact and stable long-term returns across Sub-Saharan Africa.
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Speaking on the milestone, ARM-Harith’s Chief Executive Officer, Rachel More-Oshodi, described the first close as a significant turning point for the company and infrastructure financing on the continent.
“This first close is both an achievement and an inflection point for ARM-Harith. With our first fund, we demonstrated that domestic institutional capital can be mobilised into infrastructure equity. With this successor fund, we are building on that foundation by bringing local and hard-currency capital together within a single platform,” she said.
Ms More-Oshodi added that the structure aligns investment capital more closely with the realities of African infrastructure assets and creates a scalable model capable of attracting both domestic and international investors.
Also commenting, Joao Duarte Cunha, Manager of AfDB’s Renewable Energy Funds Division, said the successful first close represented an important milestone for renewable energy investment in Sub-Saharan Africa.
“SEFA’s catalytic participation demonstrates the African Development Bank’s commitment to unlocking long-term institutional capital and shows how blended finance can mobilise private investment into sustainable infrastructure,” he said.
Anne-Marie Chidzero, Chief Investment Officer at FSDAi, said the challenge facing pension fund participation in infrastructure had never been a lack of capital but rather the absence of suitable investment vehicles.
“The constraint has never been capital itself, but the absence of investment products structured to meet pension funds’ liability-matching needs, particularly around tenure, risk allocation and currency alignment,” she said.
She noted that FSDAi’s investment structure was designed to bridge that gap, allowing pension funds to invest in infrastructure equity while remaining aligned with their investment objectives and regulatory obligations.
ARM-Harith said its predecessor fund financed critical transport infrastructure projects and more than 700 megawatts of installed power capacity across Africa.
According to the company, those investments helped create about 22,500 jobs and contributed to avoiding an estimated 2.6 million tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions annually.
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The new fund will build on those achievements by backing projects that combine strong commercial returns with measurable climate and development outcomes, the company said.
ARM-Harith, which has more than 80 years of combined investment experience across Africa, specialises in infrastructure investments spanning energy, transport and logistics, digital infrastructure, waste management and water projects.
The firm has been a key player in mobilising Nigerian pension fund capital into infrastructure investments across the continent for more than a decade.
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