Few markets have shaped the global infrastructure investment landscape as markedly as the United Kingdom, says GIIA Head of Policy and Public Affairs Harvey Chandler from the UK’s Investment Summit in Hong Kong.
Having pioneered Public‑Private Partnerships (PPPs) in the 1990s and 2000s— and revolutionised clean energy financing in the 2010s through the introduction of Contracts for Difference (CfDs) for renewable energy generation— the United Kingdom continues to refine its approach to draw in long‑term, patient capital and keep pace with its growing infrastructure ambitions.
This message was at the heart of conversations at a UK Investment Conference hosted in Hong Kong. However, it was clear that Hong Kong mirrors this dynamism in its role as one of Asia’s key infrastructure finance hubs, deploying bonds and delivering PPPs to finance infrastructure projects across the region.
To explore how the UK’s approach both attracts international investors and has influenced other markets, I moderated a panel at the UK’s recent Investment Summit in Hong Kong. Speakers included Danny Alexander, CEO of Infrastructure Finance and Sustainability at HSBC; Anne Kerr, Asia Executive Adviser at Mott MacDonald; David Martin, Managing Director for APAC at Mace Consult; and Alistair Ray, Co‑founder and Chief Investment Officer at Dalmore Capital – a GIIA member.
Together, we examined how investors, financiers, and delivery partners are navigating the challenges and opportunities shaping infrastructure financing, planning, and delivery.
What is it that makes the UK an attractive destination for investors? And what learnings are there from the experiences of those involved in infrastructure delivery in Hong Kong and the wider Asia region?
Openness to international and private investment
The UK is one of the most open markets globally for international infrastructure investment. It is supported by a long-standing, cross-party policy consensus that private capital is essential to delivering and managing infrastructure assets – most recently illustrated by the Government’s 10-Year Infrastructure Strategy. The UK has a well-established history of private participation, strong legal institutions, independent regulators, and a sophisticated financial ecosystem including high-quality professional advisors. These all play to the strength of the UK as a destination for infrastructure capital.
However, panellists noted that international investor sentiment can vary if regulation is seen to have failed, as shown in our recent Infrastructure Pulse survey (see below). The impact of regulatory challenges in the UK’s uniquely privatised water industry have clearly dampened the attractiveness of this sector. Encouragingly, the Government’s recent announcement of a reset for water regulation indicates a policy shift towards a framework that better aligns investor needs on returns and regulatory certainty with long-term infrastructure outcomes. Sustaining the UK’s attractiveness will depend on continued policy stability, and credible routes to fair, risk-adjusted returns.
Origination and evolution of financing mechanisms
The UK’s Contracts for Difference (CfD) model has been central to attracting private capital into renewable energy – particularly offshore wind. Since its launch in 2014, CfDs have supported investment in 39GW of capacity, powering around seven million homes and cutting nearly six million tonnes of CO₂ annually. For panellists in Hong Kong, CfDs were a standout example of how well-designed policy can balance investors’ needs for revenue certainty with consumer protection on prices.
Similarly, the Regulated Asset Base (RAB) model (see our briefing with Slaughter & May here) continues to reinforce the UK’s international competitiveness through the use of well understood mechanisms, which provide revenue streams through the construction phase as well as the operational phase. By providing stable, predictable returns, the model helps reduce the overall cost of capital for capital-intensive projects, thus unlocking investment.
Together, CfDs and RABs reflect the UK’s leadership in developing ‘exportable’ investment frameworks—mechanisms now being adapted internationally. In our discussion, panellists highlighted this openness to collaboration and willingness to evolve models alongside investors and advisors as a defining strength of the UK’s infrastructure system.
In parallel, Hong Kong is deepening its own toolkit through infrastructure bonds and infrastructure‑backed securities programmes, positioning the city as a platform for channelling private capital into projects across Asia. This role will only expand as the openness to private capital becomes further established, in line with exponential economic and population growth in the region.
Clarity of direction and pipeline of opportunities
The UK’s 10-Year Infrastructure Strategy, with its commitment for £725 billion of investment over the next decade, coupled with the launch of a Modern Industrial Strategy and an online, project pipeline tool— has been welcomed by both investors and those in the engineering and construction industries. Having pipeline clarity helps to de-risk investments and provides project developers with the ability to allocate resource and plan.
However, panellists cautioned that scope and ambition must be matched by realistic prioritisation and bankable project design. As one noted, “you can’t do everything, everywhere, all at once.” The challenge, therefore, lies in sequencing projects effectively, and ensuring that those brought forward have robust commercial structures that attract both equity and debt financing. Predictability of return, credible demand forecasts, and coherent risk-sharing mechanisms between the public and private sectors, are all central to converting strategic intent into investable opportunities.
Coupled with these is the need for capacity building and broader reforms to accelerate permitting and planning processes, which can otherwise delay projects. The UK’s Planning and Infrastructure Bill is a step in the right direction to unlock these processes but, as one panellist put it, there is a need for approvals to move ahead at a faster rate.
Ultimately, while the UK’s pipeline and strategic direction were seen as clear positives, investors emphasised that project bankability and consistent delivery will determine whether policy ambition translates into sustained private capital deployment over the coming decade.
For markets such as Hong Kong, the UK experience shows the importance of not only setting clear strategic priorities, but also converting them into investable, executable projects.
Hong Kong’s long‑term spatial and infrastructure planning frameworks, coupled with recent efforts to streamline land development and approvals, underline a recognition similar to the UK’s— that credible pipelines and faster delivery are central to crowding in private investment.
Our panel discussion underscored that Hong Kong, the UK, and other markets are competing not just on the volume and bankability of project pipelines, but also on the quality of their institutions, financing tools and delivery capability.
For Hong Kong, the opportunity lies in leveraging its financial hub status and emerging infrastructure financing programmes to mobilise capital into the wider region; for the UK, it sites in coupling globally recognised regulatory and financing models with sharper prioritisation and faster planning.
If both markets can sustain policy clarity while remaining open to experimentation and mutual learning, they will be well placed to capture a growing share of global infrastructure capital in the decade ahead.