Prologis is seeing logistics occupancy recovering to beyond pre-crisis levels across all its markets in Europe as the growth of e-commerce continues to deliver incremental demand into the sector.
Prologis is seeing logistics occupancy recovering to beyond pre-crisis levels across all its markets in Europe as the growth of e-commerce continues to deliver incremental demand into the sector.
'As those markets tighten and as we see strong rental recovery, particularly in supply constrained markets, we are seeing the opportunity to bring through a meaningful quantity of new speculative supply,' Philip Dunne, president Europe for Prologis, said.
Speculative development is starting in the first instance in the UK. 'We had two projects last year and I would estimate we will do at least five this year on prime/core sites and locations which we already own and control.'
'We are seeing some modest speculative development coming through in the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Poland, in the south-west of Poland in particular.'
Dunne was commenting to PropertyEU during a special Logistics Investment Briefing at MIPIM 2014 in Cannes.
Referring to the impact of internet retailing, Dunne added: 'Where markets are on average greater than 95% occupied, with demand stable and recovering, and the incremental level of demand pouring into the sector because of e-commerce, I do see some meaningful level of new supply of speculative product coming into our market in the next 12-24 months.'
Click on the link to watch the interview with Philip Dunne. Also see the April edition of PropertyEU Magazine for a report on the logistics briefing at MIPIM.