The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (Adia), one of the largest sovereign wealth funds in the world, has restructured the management of its relationships with external fund managers, who invest about 80 per cent of the fund’s nearly $350bn assets.

Sheikh Mohammed bin Khalifa al-Nahyan, a son of UAE President Sheikh Khalifa, has been appointed head of a newly created indexed funds department. Former director of external funds for the Far East, Obeid al-Suwaidi, has been appointed head of external equities, which focuses on investing through external fund managers.

The restructuring, which took place in July, is intended to change the way Adia relates to external fund managers. Previously, all external equity funds were managed through four divisions, split along geographic lines. Under the new structure, there is one department for actively managed funds and a second for indexed funds. In 2008, Adia created an internal equities division, which is responsible for investing directly in the global equity markets.

Adia invests about 60 per cent of its assets in index-linked funds.

The restructure comes as Abu Dhabi takes several measures to address funding problems in its real estate development companies. The government of Abu Dhabi also financed its AED110.5bn ($30bn) budget deficit in 2009 through transfers from Adia and the Abu Dhabi Investment Council (Adic).