HY24: Ardian cooperates with Five T Hydrogen for clean hydrogen infrastructure

Paris / Zurich — The infra­struc­ture divi­sion of Ardian, one of the world’s leading inde­pen­dent invest­ment firms, and FiveT Hydro­gen, an invest­ment plat­form specia­li­zing in clean hydro­gen, have jointly laun­ched Hy24, www.hy24partners.com. As the world’s largest clean hydro­gen infra­struc­ture invest­ment plat­form, Hy24, a joint venture company owned 50/50 by the two part­ners, will invest in projects criti­cal to global decarbonization.

Hy24 is targe­ting €1.5 billion for its first fund, making the plat­form the mana­ger of the industry’s largest clean hydro­gen infra­struc­ture fund. The fund alre­ady has commit­ments of €800 million from a number of leading indus­trial and finan­cial inves­tors, all of whom are alre­ady invol­ved in clean hydro­gen. The initia­tive for the fund can be traced back to two inves­tor groups:

Air Liquide, Total­Ener­gies and VINCI Conces­si­ons are commit­ted to the deve­lo­p­ment of low-carbon and rene­wa­ble hydro­gen and have each pled­ged €100 million in funding as anchor investors.
Plug Power, Chart Indus­tries and Baker Hughes, FiveT’s foun­ding inves­tors, will also support the new fund as anchor investors.
In addi­tion, the major South Korean group Lotte Chemi­cal and AXA, one of the world’s leading insti­tu­tio­nal inves­tors, will invest in the new fund as anchor inves­tors. Other major inter­na­tio­nal indus­trial groups with exten­sive commit­ments to carbon neutra­lity also plan to parti­ci­pate in the initia­tive. So far, these include Groupe ADP, Ball­ard, EDF and Schaeff­ler — with other part­ners expec­ted to join shortly.

The inter­na­tio­nal selec­tion process under which Hy24 was chosen as the invest­ment vehicle and the enga­ge­ment of indus­trial inves­tors was led by Société Générale.

Hy24 plans to bring toge­ther more inter­na­tio­nal insti­tu­tio­nal inves­tors and indus­try play­ers to fund hydro­gen projects around the world on a large scale.

Hy24 combi­nes Ardian’s proven infra­struc­ture invest­ment exper­tise and asset manage­ment capa­bi­li­ties with FiveT Hydrogen’s exten­sive access and expe­ri­ence in the hydro­gen value chain. This combi­na­tion crea­tes the largest and most convin­cing part­ner for energy compa­nies and inves­tors who want to contri­bute to the expan­sion of the hydro­gen infra­struc­ture. It also responds to the enorm­ous demand from govern­ments, compa­nies and inves­tors who want to support global climate targets with their invest­ments in hydro­gen. Recent analyses[2] show that by 2050, up to 100 tril­lion people will have to live on the streets. US dollars of invest­ment in hydro­gen will be requi­red to achieve green­house gas neutrality.

Hy24’s first fund is laun­ched under Article 9 of the Sustainable Finance Disclo­sure Regu­la­tion (“SFDR”) as an impact fund with the aim of redu­cing global carbon emis­si­ons. It will scale proven tech­no­lo­gies into mature infra­struc­ture assets that gene­rate predic­ta­ble cash flows and offer inves­tors exclu­sive access to a new asset class with the poten­tial to grow at a pace compa­ra­ble to rene­wa­ble energy. The port­fo­lio will be diver­si­fied across diffe­rent regi­ons (Europe, Ameri­cas and Asia) and across the value chain: from upstream projects such as green hydro­gen produc­tion to down­stream projects such as vehicle fleet and refue­ling stati­ons. The value crea­tion oppor­tu­ni­ties are signi­fi­cant and include both job crea­tion and decar­bo­niza­tion — espe­ci­ally in sectors where progress has been slow.

Mathias Burg­hardt, Head of Ardian Infra­struc­ture and Member of Ardian’s Execu­tive Commit­tee, said: “We are proud to have been selec­ted by some of the world’s leading indus­trial compa­nies and inves­tors to lead this initia­tive. The Euro­pean Union has only recently announ­ced the streng­thening of its efforts to achieve climate goals. Just before the start of the UN Climate Change Confe­rence in 2021, it is a great respon­si­bi­lity to lead such a plat­form. In the field of rene­wa­ble ener­gies, we are one of the inves­tors from the very begin­ning. Today, our plat­form has a capa­city of 7.5 GW for heat and rene­wa­bles. We expect a simi­larly promi­sing deve­lo­p­ment in the hydro­gen sector. Moreo­ver, the joint venture is exactly in line with Ardian Infrastructure’s way of working. We are confi­dent that Hy24 will play a leading role in acce­le­ra­ting hydro­gen deploy­ment, as buil­ding hydro­gen capa­city is criti­cal to decar­bo­ni­zing our economies.”

Pierre-Etienne Franc, co-foun­­der and CEO of FiveT Hydro­gen, said, “This is a major step forward for FiveT Hydro­gen. Through this unique part­ner­ship, we expect to mobi­lize €15 billion in invest­ments that will serve as a cata­lyst for the rapid expan­sion of the indus­try. The world urgen­tly needs to acce­le­rate the energy tran­si­tion and reduce carbon emis­si­ons, inclu­ding in energy-inten­­sive, hard-to-contain sectors like trans­por­ta­tion and indus­trial production.”

Hy24’s Board of Direc­tors consists of Laurent Fayol­las (Presi­dent), Pierre-Etienne Franc (CEO), Amir Sharifi (Chief Invest­ment Offi­cer), Nico­las Brahy (Gene­ral Coun­sel, Public Affairs and ESG Direc­tor) and Sébas­tien Pail­lat (Mana­ging Direc­tor, Invest­ments). A recruit­ment process is curr­ently under­way to build a dedi­ca­ted global team that will operate in France, Switz­er­land, the US and Singapore.

About Hy24

The Hy24 joint venture was estab­lished jointly by Ardian and FiveT Hydro­gen as the first major global invest­ment plat­form focu­sed exclu­si­vely on hydro­gen infra­struc­ture. It grew out of an initia­tive laun­ched by leading indus­trial compa­nies: Air Liquide, Total­Ener­gies, VINCI Conces­si­ons, Plug Power, Baker Hughes, Chart Indus­tries and AXA, a leading insti­tu­tio­nal investor.

The new invest­ment plat­form combi­nes exten­sive indus­trial exper­tise with the ability to acce­le­rate the scaling of hydro­gen solu­ti­ons along the entire value chain. These include produc­tion, conver­sion, storage, supply and use. HY24 will support large early-stage projects as well as stra­te­gic projects to become major energy infra­struc­tures. hy24partners.com

About Ardian

Ardian is one of the world’s leading inde­pen­dent invest­ment firms, mana­ging over US$114 billion in assets for its inves­tors from Europe, South and North America and Asia. The company is majo­rity-owned by its employees and gene­ra­tes sustainable, attrac­tive returns for its inves­tors. With the objec­tive of achie­ving posi­tive results for all stake­hol­ders, Ardian’s acti­vi­ties promote indi­vi­du­als, compa­nies and econo­mies world­wide. Ardian’s invest­ment philo­so­phy is aligned with the three guiding prin­ci­ples of excel­lence, loyalty and entrepreneurship.

The company has a global network of more than 750 employees and 15 offices in Europe (Frank­furt, Jersey, London, Luxem­bourg, Madrid, Milan, Paris and Zurich), South America (Sant­iago de Chile), North America (New York and San Fran­cisco) and Asia (Beijing, Seoul, Singa­pore and Tokyo). Ardian mana­ges the assets of its more than 1,200 inves­tors in five invest­ment areas: Direct Funds, Funds of Funds, Infra­struc­ture, Private Debt and Real Estate. www.ardian.com