Editor’s note: A previous version of this story stated that Carlyle had raised $621 million for the fund from US investors. It has since been updated to reflect the entire corpus secured by the vehicle. 

Private equity major Carlyle Group has closed its latest Asia-focused buyout fund at $950 million, DealStreetAsia has learnt.

The fund, Carlyle Asia Growth Partners II, focuses on growth equity investments in fast-growing businesses primarily operating in the technology, business services, healthcare, consumer, media and retail industries, according to board documents from one of its limited partners (LPs).

The fund close was first reported by Private Equity International. It has been independently confirmed by DealStreetAsia.

Carlyle’s latest Asia fund was launched in April 2021 and was understood to be seeking $1 billion in total. It attracted commitments worth $621 million from 61 US-based investors, according to a recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Among the fund’s backers is the School Employees Retirement System (SERS) of Ohio, which committed $75 million last year.

DealStreetAsia has reached out to Carlyle for comment.

The predecessor fund, initially named Carlyle Asia Growth Partners VI, closed in 2018 at $339 million, the PEI report added.

In Asia, Carlyle manages five Asia buyout funds, totalling $15.55 billion, and two China funds. In 2018, the firm raised $6.6 billion for its Asia private equity fund, its biggest at that time, exceeding a $5 billion target.

The firm has invested more than $24 billion of equity in more than 200 private equity transactions in the Asia Pacific region and more than $1.7 billion of equity in six transactions in Australia and New Zealand as of June 30, 2022.

Carlyle’s existing investments in Asia range from a stake in Chinese internet giant Tencent’s e-book unit China Literature to Metropolis Healthcare, an India-based global operator of pathology laboratories. It also invested $200 million in Kakao Mobility, South Korea’s online taxi-hailing and parking services provider.

In January, the buyout firm announced acquiring a majority stake in Indian beauty care and wellness solutions provider VLCC. The firm has invested more than $5.5 billion in over 40 transactions in India as of September 30, 2022.

The company’s notable partial exit in the Asia Pacific region in 2020 was the sale of a 10% stake in SBI Card, the second-largest credit card issuer in India, through one of the largest Indian large-cap private sector IPOs in a decade. Carlyle acquired a 26% stake in SBI Card from GE Capital in 2017.

Carlyle reported net income attributable to common stockholders of $127 million in Q4 2022 and $1.2 billion for the entire year, or $0.35 and $3.35 per share on a diluted basis, respectively.