FINLAND - An investment vehicle set up for three Nordic pension funds to invest in Finnish real estate has confirmed its move outside the capital with the acquisition of a mini-business park in Tampere.

Aberdeen set up the Real Estate Fund Finland fund in December 2006 for Ilmarinen, the Finnish €21.6bn multi-employer pension scheme, Dutch pension fund ABP and Denmark's €49.6bn ATP fund.  At its final closing in December 2007, commitments to the fund totalled €200m. 

However, the sale-and-leaseback deal announced last week with tenant Nokia Siemens Networks now brings the fund's asset value to €600m.

The three-block property, built in three phases almost a decade ago, houses two other companies working on Nokia projects.

Asset manager Mauri Laurila said the asset "would be easy to use as a multi-tenant asset" in the future because it has shared facilities, including an auditorium.

Laurila added: "There are not too many international investor-level properties readily available in Tampere, and this is the largest of those there are."

One of the drawbacks of the €35bn Finnish property market for potential institutional investors has been a paucity of acquisition opportunities outside capital Helsinki. However, Laurila last week identified Tampere, a university town the fund has already invested in, as a likely target for further acquisition.

Aberdeen's Nordic I property fund, invested primarily for German pension funds, has also targeted Turku, another university town.

Topics