Capita has raised £290m of funds in preparation for an acquisition period to try and win government contracts.

The company is currently in numerous talks which it hopes to close in the coming months. Capita has already this year shelled out £91m on acquisitions and will potentially spend just as much before the end of this year, with a particular focus on SME acquisitions.

Capita is looking to win contracts worth between £300m and £5bn which would deal with benefit systems and a nationwide contract with the emergency services.

Capita has won £900m of work so far this year, compared with £2bn for the whole of 2011, and was confident of hitting full-year organic revenue growth expectations of about 3 per cent. “We just happen to be going through a period where there is a lot going on and rather than letting the debt increase further we’d rather raise equity,” said Paul Pindar chief executive of Capita.