The Kuwait Investment Authority, which was part of a consortium that bid for UK water company Severn Trent earlier this year, has hired two former Bank of America Merrill Lynch bankers to a new London-incorporated infrastructure unit.

Kuwait's sovereign wealth fund manages assets worth around $386 billion, according to the latest numbers from the Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute, and has had a presence in London since the 1950s based at Wren House on Carter Lane in the Square Mile.