Deadline

UN-Habitat Cities Investment Facility (CIF) programme is seeking partners to develop and manage one of a number of the City Investment Vehicles (CI Vehicles), one of the three instruments of CIF. Each CI Vehicle fund will act as a broker or fund within which diverse and blended sources of capital can be pooled to finance de-risked, bankable, and sustainable urbanization projects. CI Vehicles may have general, sectoral or geographic focus.  Each CI Vehicle may also be involved in project aggregation and advising appropriate product structuring, at the upstream stage. The CI Vehicle implementing partner is expected to act as the General Partner of the fund, and raise LP capital. UN-Habitat is able to support fundraising. Interested organisations are invited to express interest and commitment to this partnership. More information on the Cities Investment Facility can be found in the CIF Brochure appended.

Submissions should be in PDF format and limited to not more than 1500 words. They may carry photos or other graphics, and may be presented as a slide deck.

  1. Please provide a narrative of no more than 250 words describing the basic information of your organisation:
    1. Name, location of the organisation;
    2. Description of the applying organisation: aims, business scope, special competencies.
    3. Name, title and contact details of the individual who will serve as a contact point for communication with the UN-Habitat CIF programme.
  1. Please provide a narrative of no more than 1250 words outlining why your organisation should be selected to partner with UN-Habitat, which shall cover:
    1. Understanding of the task at hand, including roles and responsibilities;
    2. Specific areas where the organisation sees collaboration opportunities: network, subject matter expertise, previous experience in the field, and any financial / in-kind contributions able to be made;
    3. A proposed business model: including projected financial and operational details, pricing strategy, implementation plan, and cost information.
    4. Description of appropriate licenses and regulatory arrangements;
    5. Evidence that the organisation supports the principles of the UN Global Compact and/or UN Principles of Responsible Investment.
    6. Description of the team and respective biographies of key team members.
  1. Candidate organisation will be expected to submit a Statement of Commitment that will serve as the first step in engagement with UN-Habitat.
  1. Please send to: erastus.njuki@un.org by Friday 6 November, 2020.

Note: More detailed information on the Cities Investment Facility, and the partnership, will be shared at a later stage to entities that meet the requirements of this Expression of Interest.

Appendix: High-Level Terms of Reference

Cities Investment Vehicles (CI Vehicles): Terms of Reference

 

1. Background

The Cities Investment Facility (CIF) is a multi-stakeholder initiative centred around unlocking greater capital flows to urban impact projects, by supporting their processes of ideation, design, financing, and implementation, using a series of partnership-based instruments. CIF aims to direct significant capital towards financing projects that are inclusive, masterplan-integrated, and align with UN-Habitat’s existing geographical footprint.

The Cities Investment Facility enables the flow of capital into urban impact projects by supporting the process of ideation, design, feasibility, and financial close through a series of instruments that engage city authorities, investors and other stakeholders. The instruments comprising CIF include:

  • The Cities Investment Portal (CI Portal), which allows city officials to reach out to a global audience of investors, bringing together a community of stakeholders at the ideation stage. The Portal will display information about available projects, host a grant platform, and a knowledge hub. http://cip.flywheelsites.com.
  • The Cities Investment Advisory Platform (CIAP), an incubated initiative advising pre-feasibility and upstream project preparation and design, bankability, and SDG-impact. www.citiesinvestment.org;
  • The Cities Investment Vehicles (CI Vehicles), are brokers and/or funds within which diverse and blended sources of capital can be pooled to finance de-risked, aggregated, bankable, and sustainable urbanization projects.

 

2. Goals and Responsibilities

The CI Vehicles are anticipated to involve a number of fund managers, which may bring unique (geographical or sectoral) experience, acting as General Partners. These implementing partners will be external to UN-Habitat; however, the UN-Habitat CIF Secretariat will remain crucially involved in the CI Vehicles through its role in convening the project pipeline. The aims and responsibilities of the CI Vehicles are to:

  • Arrange sustainable urbanization projects into financial products, through project aggregation and blended financing structures;
  • Channel capital from a diverse range of sources of (commercial and institutional investors, Development Finance Institutions, philanthropic organisations, Islamic funds, and governments) to CIF’s pipeline of de-risked, SDG-aligned projects.
  • Work closely with the CI Portal and CIAP to ensure investor needs are incorporated into project design at an upstream stage, sharing knowledge, feedback, and successful business models.
  • Develop a feasible business model and mobilize Limited Partners;
  • Mobilise funding to operate the CI Vehicle;
  • Support the set-up and development of a governance framework between the CI Vehicle Fund and UN-Habitat.