* Seeks $500 million to invest in industrial real estate

 Prudential Financial is launching an investment fund in Mexico to tap opportunities in industrial real estate using a new vehicle aimed at local pension funds.

Prudential (PRU.N) wants to raise up to 6.5 billion pesos ($500 million) from local pension funds by the first quarter of next year, Paulo Gomes, research director at Prudential Real Estate Investors in Latin America, or PREI, told Reuters on Thursday.

"The investment objective is industrial buildings, light manufacturing, distribution centers," he said in an interview.

PREI is issuing the fund through "capital development notes," which were introduced earlier this year along with regulatory changes that allow Mexican private pension funds to invest in infrastructure and other real estate projects.

"Until now, pension funds have not invested in this segment, real estate, because they were not allowed to," Gomes said.

The local unit of Spanish bank BBVA (BBVA.MC) is handling the fund's placement with the pension funds and other institutional investors.

Mexico's private pension fund industry, led by Citigroup (C.N), BBVA and ING (ING.AS), manages the equivalent of $85 billion in retirement savings.

In October, construction company ICA (ICA.MX)(ICA.N) and partner Goldman Sachs Group Inc (GS.N) raised $477 million in a stock market sale of the first such securities, which were backed by 30-year concession to operate more than 310 miles (500 km) of highways in central Mexico.

PREI had $44 billion of assets under management at the end of June, including $7 billion in Latin America.