(Bloomberg) -- Morgan Stanley is shaking up its private equity division in Asia following the retirement of veteran employees Chin Chou and Andrew Hawkyard, according to a memo.

Chou has been with the bank for 35 years and led the Asia private equity business. Hawkyard, who most recently served as chief investment officer of private equity in Asia, has been at Morgan Stanley for 24 years. A company representative confirmed the contents of the memo.

The bank is reorganizing the team to optimize its investing footprint in the region following the senior management changes by combining its onshore and offshore China-focused investing teams into one China team, the memo said. Jun Xu, who joined the firm in 2005, will expand his current responsibilities as head of yuan funds and lead all private equity investing in the country. Nirav Mehta and Arjun Saigal, currently co-heads of India private equity, will assume the role of co-heads of Asia private equity ex-China. 

Global asset managers including TPG Inc., Carlyle Group and Warburg Pincus have diversified away from China as the country’s real estate crisis, regulatory crackdowns and rift with the US force foreign investors to reassess prospects for returns. Japan and India are among the countries benefiting as capital flows to where returns are expected to be higher. 

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