Weekly Data Sheet - 2 May 2025

Inmobiliaria Colonial is investing in Stoneshield Capital’s Deeplabs science & innovation platform known as Deeplabs, which owns three campuses in Madrid and Barcelona worth a total of €400m.

Colonial, a Spanish REIT landlord with a portfolio largely consisting of core office properties, is spending €200m to recapitalise Stoneshield’s 138,000m2 Spanish portfolio of purpose-built workspaces and facilities as well as to fund Deeplabs’ ambitious expansion programme which will be managed on a 50-50 basis with Stoneshield.

Though initially funded by Colonial as anchor investor, the new JV also plans to conduct a primary capital raise of €350m to finance “an identified short-term pipeline” of science & Innovation facilities in Paris, Lisbon, Cambridge and Amsterdam. In the medium-term, the partners plan to grow the Deeplabs portfolio to some €2.4bn of properties across Europe, fueled by third-party capital.

In particular, Deeplabs will be looking to take advantage of strong fundamentals for highly specialised office and lab facilities on the back of i) Europe approving unprecedented spending in R&D and security budgets, ii) companies shifting towards near shoring their manufacturing and R&D activities, iii) lack of private players with expertise to attend science & innovation tenants which have complex needs.

“Europe’s security budget is set to rise from €400 billion to €1.2 trillion by 2026,” commented Juan Pepa, Managing Partner and Co-founder of Stoneshield Capital. “This unprecedented growth will unleash massive demand for space from companies looking to innovate, test, manufacture, and operate.”

Felipe Morenés, also Managing Partner and Co-founder of Stoneshield Capital, added: “The need for strategic real estate is essential if Europe is to make progress in key sectors such as security, health, and technology. Our goal is to support governments and companies by providing highly specialized properties—critical infrastructure for innovation and operational success.”

For Colonial, the new venture is part of plans to focus on “high-growth sectors with rising demand”. “We have long been developing urban transformation assets to drive growth and profitability,” said Pere Viñolas, CEO of Colonial. “Today’s announcement is a natural extension of that strategy as we continue to position our core office portfolio alongside our growing mixed-use portfolio. There is a significant shortage of suitable assets in the European Science & Innovation sector, at a time when demand is rapidly and sustainably rising. With current supply unable to meet this demand, and a lack of real estate expertise to deliver high-quality lab spaces, we see a strong opportunity to build a pan-European platform that meets the needs of long-term, high-quality tenants.”

Also this week, two major European hotel platforms changed hands. Marriott International reached an agreement to acquire the lifestyle brand citizenM from the Dutch pension fund APG, Singapore’s GIC and citizenM’s founder and chairman Rattan Chadha, in a deal worth $355m. Similarly, Tristan Capital Partners emerged as the buyer of the easyHotel European budget hotel chain from owners ICAMAP and Ivanhoé Cambridge as well as founder Stelios Haji-Ioannou.