GuarantCo has opened a new office in Nairobi, Kenya, as it is looking to expand its business in financing infrastructure development in East and Southern Africa.

Andrew Bainbridge, GuarantCo Chairman, said: “We are delighted to strengthen our presence in the region. The opening of the Nairobi office demonstrates our commitment to helping project developers, banks and institutional investors deliver priority infrastructure on a sustainable basis."

“We see this as an important next phase of our growth as a company, which accelerates our ability to work with clients to deliver solutions that benefit society,” he said.

GuarantCo, a Facility of the Private Infrastructure Development Group, provides local currency and dollar-denominated guarantees to banks and bond investors, to support infrastructure projects.

The fast-growing African infrastructure market is expected to represent at least 50% of GuarantCo’s future business.

Janice Kotut-Sang of Frontier Markets Fund Managers will act as GuarantCo’s Regional Director for East and Southern Africa, heading up the new Nairobi-based operation.

She has over ten years banking experience with Standard Chartered, most recently as London-based Director, Origination and Client Coverage focusing on mining clients in Africa.

She has worked in Asia, UK and in Kenya with a varied number of roles in business strategy and origination, including four years running a floriculture operation in Kenya.

In addition, Eugene Ntananga joins GuarantCo as the Investment Advisor for East & Southern Africa.

He has over 10 years’ experience spanning Pension Fund Management in East Africa & MBS Underwriting in the US.

Prior to Joining GuarantCo and FMFML, he managed a $1.6bn fixed income portfolio with the National Social Security Fund (NSSF) of Uganda.

GuarantCo has strong capitalisation and a guarantee-issuing capacity of close to $1bn for local currency infrastructure financing.

It has strong international investment grade ratings from Fitch (AA- stable), Moody’s (A1 stable) and Cote D’Ivoire-based Bloomfield (AAA stable).

GuarantCo will be looking to especially support transactions in the energy, transport and housing sectors.

“The growing volume of local currency savings and pension pools as well as the development of the local capital markets will create opportunities for structuring new forms of financing which GuarantCo hopes to support,” added Bainbridge.