Ardian appoints senior energy executive

Ardian, the independent private investment company, has announced the appointment of Simo Santavirta to strengthen the industrial expertise within its Infrastructure team in line with its strategy to move to a more industrial approach in the asset management of its portfolio companies.

Mr Santavirta joins Ardian Infrastructure with over 18 years’ industry experience, of which 13 years were spent at the global power generation group, InterGen, while being based in Europe, Asia, Australia and North America.

At InterGen, most recently he held the position of Vice President, Strategy and Portfolio Management, based in InterGen’s head office in the USA. Prior to that, his other roles at InterGen include Vice President and General Manager in the Philippines and Director of Business Development for North West Europe.

An engineer by background, Mr Santavirta started his career at Finnish energy company, Fortum Oyj in 1998.

Mr Santavirta’s appointment follows several strategic investments in the energy sector by Ardian Infrastructure over the last year including CLH, ENOVOS and Geosel. He will be based in Paris and will coordinate asset management across the Ardian Infrastructure portfolio.

Mathias Burghardt, Head of Ardian Infrastructure, said:

“Simo brings to Ardian unique experience in the energy industry. We are seeing many more opportunities in this area, and Simo’s skills and insight will be deployed across our portfolio. As leading European infrastructure fund manager we are moving towards an industrial approach of our energy and transport infrastructures to ensure we deliver the best results for all stakeholders, from investors to public and private partners.”

Mr Santavirta, Managing Director Ardian Infrastructure added:

“I am very excited to join Ardian and its infrastructure team. Ardian has had great success in investing in infrastructure over the past 10 years and I look forward to working with the team and all Ardian’s partners in the future.”