Allianz Real Estate Names Scott Kim as APAC Head

European insurance giant Allianz did not have to look too far for the new head of its real estate unit for Asia Pacific, with company representatives informing Mingtiandi on Wednesday that it has hired NPS veteran Scott Kim to replace Rush Desai, who resigned in March.

Kim, who led the real estate investment division of Korea’s National Pension Service when the organisation formed a $2.3 billion fund with Allianz in 2020, will take over the top role at his former business partner from 1 July, with the news having first been reported by PERE.

A graduate of Columbia University and Harvard’s graduate school of design, Kim is expected to continue the initiatives established by Desai, who had set up Allianz Real Estate’s presence in the region in 2016, while also working more closely with the company’s parent organisation, Pimco, which began integrating the property investment firm into its operations in 2020.

Kim will also have the advantage of being familiar with his new boss, Allianz Real Estate global chief Francois Trausch, from when both executives worked at GE nearly one decade ago.

Investment Heavyweight

During his time at the NPS, Kim had transformed the sovereign investment giant into one of the world’s real estate investment heavyweights, establishing multibillion-dollar strategies with fund managers including Tishman Speyer, Hines and Blackstone, while also directly acquiring assets.

In addition to the 2020 venture with Allianz, which targets core assets across Asia Pacific, the fund gave a $1.5 billion US investment mandate to Tishman Speyer in November last year after teaming up with Hines to buy the PG&E campus in San Francisco for a $2.5 billion redevelopment project in September.

In July 2021, the NPS went solo to acquire the Melbourne Quarter Tower in Australia from Lendlease for $900 million after committing $900 million to a Blackstone fund in March.

In addition to its core venture with the NPS, Allianz Real Estate last December set up a Japan multifamily venture with Ivanhoe Cambridge as its second vehicle managing third-party capital in the region.

In March, Allianz put $90 million from that multifamily strategy to work buying 12 Tokyo residential assets, and in January of this year its fund with the NPS bought a half-stake in a Sydney office complex for $445 million.

Leadership Transition

Kim had led the fund’s real estate division from 2013 to October of last year, when he left the firm, reportedly to be closer to his family in Singapore.

From 2007 to 2013, Kim was a senior asset manager at GE Capital in Seoul, and he also served as an equity sales trader at Credit Suisse First Boston and Hyundai Securities earlier in his career.

With Kim now set to take over responsibility for Allianz Real Estate’s $9.2 billion in assets under management in the region, Desai will be leaving the firm at the end of this month.