Barry Whyte

Blackstone, the private equity firm, has completed its $1.02Bn purchase of 180 industrial properties from ProLogis, a distribution facilities company in Denver, Colorado. The deal includes its North American industrial portfolio, its minority stake in the Hilton New Orleans Riverside, and ProLogis’s interest in three of its property funds.

Royal Bank of Scotland has hired Morgan Stanley to advise it on a potential sale of its Spanish assets, believed to be in the region of $1 billion pounds ($1.6 billion). RBS previously attracted private equity interest in its British portfolio – with Blackstone interested, as well as Lone Star and Goldman Sachs – though RBS had not at the time decided whether to sell. RBS has a 5-year plan to clear 250 billion pounds ($397 billion) of non-core assets.

Private equity firm MerchantBridge, which has more than $1.5 billion of investments in Iraq, has launched the Mesopotamia Fund to further invest in Iraqi equities. MerchantBridge also plans to close a deal of up to $100 million in Saudi Arabia next year.

Invest AD, the investment vehicle owned by the government of Abu Dhabi, plans to raise $400 million for a new private equity fund by 2011, it announced today. The first closing of the fund will happen by the end of this year for $175 million, with Invest AD including $75 million of its own seed capital. The rest would be raised in 2011.

Citadel Capital, the Egyptian private equity firm, could list two of its portfolio companies in the next year to two years, the firm said. The companies were not named, but managing director Stephen Murphy said that the listings would take place in Egypt and could be worth between $175 and $250 million. Citadel Capital manages about $8.3 billion in investments spanning 14 countries.

Dubai International Capital has said that it is not the right time to sell its European assets and that it won’t sell anything before 2011. DIC is undergoing a debt restructuring at the moment. Its assets include UK hotel chain Travelodge and Doncasters.

Three U.S. private equity firms, Carlyle, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co and Warburg Pincus, are negotiating a possible purchase of a 15 to 18 percent stake in Hero Honda Motors, the top Indian motorcycle manufacturer, according to reports. Japan’s Honda Motor holds 26 percent of the company.

Kate Barker has been named as a non-executive director of Electra Private Equity PLC, having previously served as a member of Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee. Barker also worked as an advisor to Credit Suisse, chairman of Anglia Ruskin University, non-executive director of the Homes and Community Agency, and on the council of the National Institute of Economic and Social Research.

KKR has bid around $1.73 billion for Australian fund manager Perpetual, based on an offer of A$38 to A$40 per share, a 29 percent premium on the fund manager’s Friday close. Perpetual said it was considering the bid.

Buyout firm KKR has bought German drugs distributor Anzag with the aim of giving British pharmacy chain Alliance Boots access to the European market, according to reports. KKR, which already had 30 percent of Anzag through Alliance Boots, increased that stake to 80 percent. Anzag is one of the three biggest firms in the EUR 24 billion ($31 billion) German drugs distribution market.