(Bloomberg) -- Apax Partners has raised more than $10 billion in five months for the first close of a new flagship private equity fund, people familiar with the matter said -- about 75% of its target.

The London-based buyout firm is chasing roughly $13 billion for the latest global vehicle and plans to continue to raise funds from investors into next year, one of the people said, asking not to be identified discussing confidential information.

A representative for Apax declined to comment.

Apax closed its Apax X global fund at about $11 billion in early 2021. The firm also manages a range of region-specific funds that target investments across the technology, services, health care and internet and consumer sectors, according to its website.

Its new fundraise comes at a challenging time for private equity firms, which are facing more difficult dealmaking in a rising interest rate environment for the first time in more than a decade. The worsening macroeconomic outlook is leading some institutional investors to plan to trim allocations to private equity and venture capital funds.

This has ratcheted up competition in the race for investor cash and even the biggest names in the industry -- including Blackstone Inc. and Apollo Global Management Inc. -- have been deploying new tactics to beat out rivals. 

Apollo Co-President Scott Kleinman this week described the recent private equity fund raising environment as a “wacky dynamic,” saying there was an unusual number of managers seeking fresh capital. Investors who had already assigned their capital for 2022 were asking Apollo to keep its flagship fund raise open until next year in order to get an allocation, he said.

Read more: EQT Raises $15 Billion for New Fund, Defying Market Headwinds

(Adds fundraising timeline in second paragraph, Scott Kleinman quote in final paragraph)

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