Infrastructure projects where many partners and technologies must work together to produce a functioning and sustainable outcome are often challenging. Australia, Canada and UK are among the few countries that have actively been rethinking infrastructure procurement. In these countries, the private sector has been given a bigger share in infrastructure projects, and this trend is spreading to other countries. The authors contribute to the literature by investigating infrastructure owners’ and investors’ motives and challenges to engage in closer collaboration in a country using traditional procurement methods. They identify problems in building successful collaboration and suggest ways to overcome these challenges.