The world’s largest pension fund is set to begin internal discussions over whether or not it should begin investing in alternative assets for the first time. With around $1.4 trillion of assets under management, the private equity industry is keeping its fingers firmly crossed.

At the end of last year Japan's Government Pension Investment Fund hired four companies - comprising European fund of funds manager Capital Dynamics, Tokyo-based private equity consultancy Brightrust PE Japan, Japanese law firm Atsumi & Sakai and Japanese asset manager T&D - to conduct feasibility studies into whether or not it the fund should diversify its assets into private equity, real estate and infrastructure. The fund has since received reports back from those studies and will shortly begin talks, a GPIF spokesman told Private Equity News, a sister publication of Financial News.