Private equity giant EQT has closed its latest Asia-focused private equity fund at $15.6 billion, marking the largest vehicle dedicated to the region to date, according to an announcement Tuesday.
The fund, BPEA Private Equity Fund IX, was oversubscribed and reached its hard cap, with $14.9 billion in fee-generating assets under management. The vehicle was launched in August 2024 with a target of $12.5 billion and a hard cap of $14.5 billion.
The predecessor fund, BPEA VIII, had raised over $11 billion in 2022.
The milestone comes against a difficult backdrop for Asian private equity fundraising, which fell to a 12-year low in 2025 after four consecutive years of decline, according to Bain & Company.
Investor demand was driven by a globally diversified base, including pension funds and sovereign wealth funds, with commitments broadly balanced across the Americas, Europe, the Middle East and Asia Pacific.
EQT said the fund attracted more than 75 new investors, reflecting growing consolidation of capital toward large, established platforms with proven track records.
“The closing of BPEA IX is a defining milestone that reflects the depth, strength, and investment performance of our platform over nearly three decades, bringing together the history of BPEA and EQT in Asia,” said Jean Eric Salata, chairperson of EQT Asia.
BPEA IX will focus on control investments in sectors including technology, healthcare, industrial technology, and services, targeting companies with resilient fundamentals, per the announcement.
“The opportunity in Asia today has shifted from chasing growth to leading profound structural transformation,” said Hari Gopalakrishnan and Nicholas Macksey, deputy co-heads of Private Capital Asia at EQT
The new fund is currently 5-10% invested, including closed and/or signed investments, announced public offers, based on the actual fund size.
EQT, one of Asia’s most active private equity investors, allocated roughly 20% of its 16 billion euros of 2025 investments to the region, according to its earnings presentation.
The firm is reportedly preparing to kick off a new round of fundraising for its next Asia mid-market fund.
In 2024, EQT closed its Asia mid-market growth fund at $1.6 billion, which more than doubled its original target size of $750 million.
Some of EQT’s Southeast Asia portfolio, including from the BPEA business, are Indonesian natural ingredients provider Indesso; Singapore-based healthcare platform MHC Asia and video game development firm Virtuos; integrated retail platform The CrownX, and education companies VUS and ILA in Vietnam.
EQT announced total gross fund exits of 19 billion euros in 2025. In addition, it realised 14 billion euros ($16.6 billion) for its co-investors, making last year its most active exit year ever in terms of total realisations.
About 24% of the total gross fund exits were from Asia, including sell-downs in Hong Kong-listed Horizon Robotics from BPEA VII and India-listed Sagility from BPEA VIII. Other exits include Nord Anglia from BPEA VI and Pioneer from BPEA VI and BPEA VII.
The final close of BPEA IX comes as fundraising activity for Southeast Asia-focused private equity stalled later in 2025 as mounting macro uncertainty and escalating geopolitical tensions in West Asia weighed on LP sentiment and slowed capital formation.
Data from DealStreetAsia’s latest report—Southeast Asia Private Equity Funds: H2 2025—reveals a stark reality for dedicated regional managers. Only two Southeast Asia-focused funds, defined as those with full or majority allocations to the region, reached a final close in the second half of 2025
