German shopping centre developer ECE has confirmed plans to start up a real estate fund management subsidiary, but declined to comment further on the move. 'I can confirm that ECE wants to start in this field of business and that it is building up a fund management firm called ECE Real Estate Partners,' a company spokesperson told PropertyEU.
German shopping centre developer ECE has confirmed plans to start up a real estate fund management subsidiary, but declined to comment further on the move. 'I can confirm that ECE wants to start in this field of business and that it is building up a fund management firm called ECE Real Estate Partners,' a company spokesperson told PropertyEU.
Earlier this week, German magazine Immobilien Zeitung reported that ECE is putting together its first real estate fund with initial equity of EUR 400 mln provided by a range of pension funds, sovereign wealth funds and other institutional investors, as well as by the fund management and the Otto family which owns ECE.
The ECE European Prime Shopping Centre Fund is acquiring the 35,000-m2 SternCenter mall in Potsdam, the LindenCenter in Berlin and the 43,000-m2 Galeria Kaskada in Stettin, due to open later this year. The investment fund, which will focus on German assets, held its first closing at end-December and will have the right of first refusal on all of ECE's shopping centres.
