Building Value Through Infrastructure Investing
Infrastructure is playing a pivotal role in driving the next wave of economic transformation. With the rapid digitalization of industry has come an insatiable demand for power generation and the increasing need to invest in the system that transmits and distributes energy. Spanning digital infrastructure, energy, and utilities sectors, IMCO’s Infrastructure strategy is designed to sit at the nexus of these long-term trends and capitalize on them.
Matthew Mendes, Managing Director and Head of Infrastructure, discusses how the team's management and direct ownership of investments is creating lasting value for IMCO’s portfolio.
What defines IMCO’s infrastructure strategy and how do you ensure portfolio diversification?
Our infrastructure strategy is centred around three core pillars: digital infrastructure, clean energy and utilities, which together, positions us well to capitalize on the growing global demand for energy. Although these areas are closely linked, they offer our portfolio diversified exposure to how energy is produced, delivered and consumed. By focusing on critical assets that connect energy generation to end users, from industrial operations and digital networks to everyday consumers, we continue to capture growth opportunities across our core sectors.
We also make selective investments in areas such as transportation, which play a complementary but largely uncorrelated role to our three pillars, further strengthening portfolio diversification.
As a Canadian institutional investor, what opportunities are you seeing in your own backyard?
Canada offers a range of compelling investment opportunities, which we are actively exploring to complement our existing domestic exposure. We’re seeing attractive potential in established infrastructure assets, especially across energy and transportation, where long-term fundamentals and scale align well with our investment approach.
Our ability to invest at scale, even in incremental amounts, is a rare advantage. This is especially critical as large-scale nation building projects move along the development curve from greenfield to brownfield; and more modest, downstream investment opportunities are overlooked by larger funds. IMCO uniquely fills this snack bracket to get projects over the finish line.
As IMCO’s infrastructure strategy matures, how has your investment approach evolved?
From the outset, our strategy aimed to capitalize on long-term trends of digitalization and energy needs. Through disciplined execution and strong partnerships, we scaled our program quickly, adding high quality assets and establishing IMCO as a preferred investor. We value diversification across sectors, technologies and geographies and have designed a truly global program that is able to take advantage of long-term trends. We have added more and more to our direct investing program over time and believe in the value of active asset management. This approach has yielded and is expected to continue to yield excellent investment outcomes for years to come.
There has been a noticeable shift away from corporate clean energy commitments. Has this influenced your investment direction in any way?
Our approach has always been grounded in market fundamentals and focused on the technologies best suited to each region, and that hasn’t changed. Our investments are not predicated on public policy support, and there is stronger demand than ever before for energy deployment, which means renewables will continue playing a role in increasing supply, especially since they remain among the most cost-efficient sources of new energy. We’re also seeing growing opportunities in systems that integrate and optimize power across regions and continents, reinforcing our conviction that the global energy transition is a long-term investment theme.
How do you "future proof" investments that are made with a very long-time horizon in mind?
We take a long-term view at every stage of the investment cycle, no matter what the asset is. For example, in digital infrastructure and energy, strategic upgrades, targeted capital investments and operational improvements are continuously being made to meet changing technology and market needs. For larger, established assets, future proofing comes through strategic upgrades, ensuring we have the right management team in place and making capital investments that improve efficiency and ultimately phase aging systems. For mature assets, we focus on generating reliable returns through dividends and capital to capture value for the portfolio.
What does it take to win access to high-barrier investment opportunities and how does IMCO position itself as a preferred investor?
Access to these opportunities comes down to expertise, scale and partnership. Our infrastructure team takes a very hands-on, diligent approach and oftentimes features active participation on boards, contributing not only capital but also organizational depth and industry insight. Meanwhile, our size and flexibility are key advantages in the process. We can invest across the capital spectrum through various cheque sizes depending on business needs. This allows us to support companies on their growth journeys. In fact, several of our long-standing portfolio companies began as smaller investments that we helped scale over time, which I believe really differentiates us. We also bring deep sector expertise, with teams that identify best-in-class opportunities and work closely with management to shape strategy, strengthen leadership and align incentives. These offerings collectively help us stand out as a preferred investor in competitive markets.
Can you highlight any examples of collaboration between Infrastructure and other teams of IMCO?
We’ve collaborated closely with IMCO's Investment and Economics Research team. Their analysis on artificial intelligence, battery technology, inflation and macroeconomic policy has helped shape our view of long-term infrastructure demands. These insights have helped guide our decisions on which sectors and jurisdictions are most attractive, ensuring our investments are grounded in a forward-looking view of the global economy.
Looking ahead, what excites you most about the future of infrastructure, either within your portfolio or across the broader market?
I think there’s a growing recognition of just how critical infrastructure is to a well-functioning and highly competitive economy. The intersection of the digital era and rising energy needs alongside shifting global trade and security dynamics has really put the spotlight on this asset class. In a way, the world is being rewired, and infrastructure is sitting at the centre of that. That’s creating many opportunities to build and modernize assets at scale and deliberately shape the foundation of the global economy for decades to come.