The Japanese banking group is creating a project office for Asian infrastructure, which it views as an important growth area.

Japanese investment banking and wealth manager Nomura has unveiled plans to set up a new Asia Infrastructure Project Office to expand and develop its Asia platform. 

The new business will be based in Singapore and is expected to launch in August this year. The business, in a new growth area for Nomura, will focus on demand for funds to finance infrastructure projects in Asia as global investors increasingly seek alternative investments, it said in a statement yesterday.

“This is an exciting development for Nomura as we look to help our clients in Asia add value to their businesses through investment in infrastructure projects,” said Mitsutoshi Murakata, head of the Asia Infrastructure Project Office. 

The team aims to enhance Nomura’s role as an intermediary and network hub between Southeast Asia and Japan, as well as other regions, by using Nomura’s existing platform and collaborating with other divisions to strengthen the group’s presence in Asia as a whole.

Governments in Asia and other regions are expected to be moving to unclog pipelines of infrastructure projects this year and further ahead, according to a report earlier this year from KPMG. In the case of Asia’s two “BRICS”, KPMG noted that China has published a pipeline of more than 2,000 public-private partnership projects. The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and the “One Belt, One Road” project have the potential to be game changers, the report said. Meanwhile, India is becoming a more vigorous force as Narendra Modi's administration seeks to push through projects and make the country an easier place in which to do business.

Wealth
Nomura is also developing a wealth management presence in the Asia region. In October last year, the Japanese firm appointed Coutts' Johnny Heng as chief investment officer, wealth management for Asia excluding Japan. Heng was managing director and head of investment services, Asia at Coutts. 

At the start of January 2015, Nomura appointed former senior Morgan Stanley wealth manager Amanda Chen as deputy head of wealth management Asia ex-Japan. Chen was the former head of private wealth management for Singapore at Morgan Stanley, where she had worked for more than a decade. 

In 2014, the bank made a series of moves to drive further growth across its wealth management business in Asia, including Japan. A new wealth management business was established within the firm’s retail division, integrating the Japan wealth management group with the Asia wealth management business.