Hedge fund manager Orchard Capital Partners, which spun-off Stark Investments in 2009, said it has launched a new long/short fund on Thursday which it aims to grow to $500 million in two-three years.

The fund, Orchard Gemini, which began trading in January is expected to open up to outside investors in April 2010.

Orchard was formed in October 2009 after Teall Edds and Stuart Wilson who were running Stark's Asia investments quit the Milwaukee-based hedge fund taking the firm's Hong Kong and Singapore operations with them.

Orchard has around $400 million in assets under management in equities, illiquid credit and multi-strategy funds. The hedge fund manager is also a sub-adviser to some of Stark's investments in Asia.

This new long/short fund will look to invest across the region, most notably in Australia, South Korea, Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan, India, China, Taiwan and Indonesia, said Orchard Capital in a statement.

"When we established Orchard late last year, we did so with the intention that equities would ultimately make up about half of our business," said Edds, who is a principal at Orchard.

Orchard Capital hired Alex Lin from Credit Suisse as a senior portfolio manager in October and launched an equity fund for an outside investor in November.

Source: Reuters