People moves: M7 names Robillard France MD; Caco heads BGO Canadian development

ASR Real Estate, BGO, Silbury Finance, Trez Capital, M7 Real Estate, Ascend Properties, Peabody, Gresham House, CA Ventures, LBP AM, Allegory Real Estate Solutions, Montagu Evans, Evora Global

M7 Real Estate – Jean-Kévin Robillard has been appointed managing director of France. Based in Paris, Robillard replaces Chris Pope, who retired from M7 in July this year after nearly a decade with the firm. Robillard will be responsible for leading the growth of M7’s platform in the French market. He will also oversee M7’s acquisition and asset management strategies throughout France, particularly in the retail warehouse and industrial sectors on behalf of its pan-European value-add funds and separate accounts. Robillard has been working for M7 as senior asset manager since he joined in September 2022. Prior to this, he spent six years at Scaprim as a director for retail investment and asset management. Robillard also spent nine years at AEW Europe in the retail asset management team, where he progressed to associate director.

ASR Real Estate – Bart Vink has been appointed head of fund management. He takes on this leadership role in addition to his current position as fund manager for the ASR Dutch Prime Retail Fund. Vink returned to ASR Real Estate three years ago as fund manager of the ASR Dutch Prime Retail Fund, the fund he helped to structure and launch in 2011. Before that, he spent six years at Redevco in various positions, including head of research and strategy.

BGO – Brad Caco has been appointed head of Canadian development, where he will be responsible for delivering on the firm’s C$8bn (€5.36bn) real estate development pipeline across all asset classes in Canada. Caco joined BGO’s predecessor firm Bentall Kennedy in 2016, with responsibility for leading the firm’s eastern Canada development activity.

Silbury Finance – Matt Taylor has been appointed chief financial and operating officer and Andrew Fairley as head of credit. Taylor will be responsible for scaling Silbury’s finance and compliance functions. Taylor was previously CFO of two Oaktree-backed development and operational businesses, where he was responsible for the delivery of over 17,000 residential beds across Europe. Fairley will lead the firm’s credit underwriting and portfolio management function. He brings over 25 years of corporate banking and credit risk experience, primarily in residential development. Fairley previously held senior roles at Paragon Development Finance, Housing Growth Partnership and Lloyds Banking Group. Jamie Rahder has been promoted to head of origination and will be leading the origination and execution of Silbury’s lending strategy in the living sector.

Gresham House – Claire Cooper has been appointed director of shared ownership operations and Matthew Painter has been named director of development and delivery. Cooper was previously head of homeownership at Peabody. She has also worked across a range of property management roles for other housing associations and private investors, including Optivo, One Housing and Heylo. Painter was most recently senior development manager at CA Ventures, having previously held development manager roles at Guild Living and Unite Students.

Trez Capital – The North American non-bank commercial real estate investor and financier has appointed John L Creswell as executive managing director, global head of capital raising. Creswell will lead the Toronto-based capital raising team, developing and executing the firm’s capital raising strategy across all distribution channels, including institutional, retail and private wealth, throughout all global markets. Before joining Trez Capital, Creswell served as executive managing director at Duff & Phelps Investment Management. Creswell also worked for BNP Paribas Asset Management NA. He spent 12 years serving in several senior positions at Nuveen. Before that, Creswell worked with EY’s real estate practice group as an auditor and management consultant.

LBP AM – Christophe Murciani has been appointed to lead the real estate debt team to help expand the asset management offering in the asset class. Since 2017, he had worked at Sienna Private Credit as head of real estate debt funds and a member of the management committee. Murciani began his career at Société Générale in 1993 within the securitisation group before joining CDC Marchés (which became Natixis) in 2000. In 2005, he joined Citigroup as head of France, Benelux and Italy. He was then appointed head of financing in Europe at Tishman Speyer in 2008, head of investments in France at Cityhold in 2010, and head of financing advisory at JLL in 2013.

Montagu Evans –  The planning and development consultancy firm has appointed Mathilde Francois-Downey as sustainability manager. Francois-Downey will work with colleagues to deepen and expand the sustainability and ESG advice the partnership provides to clients. She joins from Evora Global where she advised global real estate investment clients on their ESG programme development and implementation including external reporting, net zero carbon targets and pathway development. Prior to this, she worked at Wood Group, supporting clients in the delivery of environmental impact assessments for infrastructure projects.

Allegory Real Estate Solutions – Paul van Stiphout has set up the new strategic consulting business, to help institutional investors, investment managers and operators in real estate with a variety of challenges. Van Stiphout is a long-standing industry member with former roles at APG Asset Management, CBRE Investment Management and Catella.

Ascend Properties – The UK lettings and property manager has appointed Paul Borrmann as its new managing director. Borrmann was previously managing director of Dandara Living. Prior to joining Dandara Living, Borrmann launched the northern PRS and BTR operation for Grainger in his position as head of northern lettings. In his new role, Borrmann will lead the strategic expansion of Ascend’s BTR operator capabilities.