Ivanhoé Cambridge has acquired another logistics property through its Australian asset manager, Logos.
The asset, in Broadmeadows, Melbourne, will be developed into a A$230m (€140m) facility.
Since entering the Australian market in 2016, when it set up the Logos Australian Venture, Ivanhoé Cambridge has established a portfolio valued at more than A$1bn.
“Our strategy for Australia is to develop and value-add,” George Agethen, Ivanhoé Cambridge senior vice president for Asia Pacific, told IPE Real Assets today.
“When we look at Australia against the other developed markets in Asia – Singapore and Japan – it has provided us with outperformance in logistics,” he said.
“Our strategy is to focus on Sydney and Melbourne, with their positive growth and demographics. Our Australian experience has been particularly strong.
“Obviously, logistics is a hugely popular sector today, having experienced significant cap rate contraction over the last five years. It has benefitted from the growth of e-commerce and has shown its resilience in this COVID environment.”
Agethen said Ivanhoé Cambridge was undertaking development of logistics assets in several Asian markets, including Singapore, Indonesia, China, and India. On completion, the portfolio would be worth about US$3bn (€2.5bn).
He said the Canadian institution was also interested in Australia’s built-to-rent sector but acknowledged that this was in its infancy and that there were barriers such as the level of federal and state taxes.
Ivanhoé Cambridge was actively looking for opportunities to invest in Australia, he said, and one of these had been the office sector.
“But the definition of office is probably changing, and we don’t know how COVID-19 might impact on the use of office space in future,” he said.
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