The One Paramount office complex in Chennai (Image: Cushman & Wakefield)
Singapore’s Keppel Ltd has sold an office complex in Chennai to a fund managed by Nuvama Asset Management and Cushman & Wakefield for INR 25.5 billion ($287.4 million).
Temasek-backed Keppel unloaded the One Paramount business park after buying the 9 acre (3.6 hectare) campus a little over a year ago from Canadian pension giant CPPIB and Indian builder RMZ for INR 22 billion, as India’s hot office market continues to push up asset values.
The property in Chennai’s Porur office hub comprises 2.4 million square feet (222,967 square metres) of commercial space with tenants including tech majors and so-called global capability centres (GCCs), the offshore units set up by multinationals to provide support services.
The deal marks the second acquisition by the Prime Offices Fund managed by NCW, a 50:50 joint venture of property services firm Cushman & Wakefield and Mumbai-based Nuvama, after the vehicle reportedly bought Delhi’s Prius Platinum office building for INR 7.5 billion.
“Chennai continues to attract deep occupier interest, especially from GCCs, and Porur stands out as a micro-market with long-term fundamentals,” NCW chief investment officer Gaurav Puri said in a release. “As we expand our footprint, our focus remains on high quality ‘offices of the future’ that meet the expectations of our investors and set new benchmarks for commercial real estate in India.”
Paramount Pickup
In late July of last year, SGX-listed Keppel announced its acquisition of One Paramount as part of plans to create a fund tapping investor interest in India’s growing office market, saying at the time that the complex could potentially be included among the vehicle’s seed assets.
NCW chief investment officer Gaurav Puri
Now the Grade A asset has passed to Prime Offices Fund, which hit a $200 million first closing in January and invests in premium properties in Bengaluru, Delhi NCR, Pune, Mumbai, Chennai and Hyderabad. The fund’s investors are understood to include domestic family offices and high-net-worth individuals.
NCW billed the One Paramount trade as the largest ever by a domestic fund in India.
“This second acquisition under Prime is a strong validation of our strategy and execution,” Puri said. “With this, we’re reinforcing our commitment to building a portfolio that reflects the evolving priorities of global occupiers: sustainability, agility, and institutional-grade quality.”
Gross leasing volume in India’s office market totalled 20 million square feet in the April-June period, marking the highest-ever reading for a second quarter, and reached 39.5 million square feet for the first half, up 17.6 percent from H1 2024, according to JLL.
New office completions totalled 14.8 million square feet during the second quarter, up 30.8 percent year-on-year, as office vacancy in India’s top seven cities stood at 16.1 percent, down 90 basis points from a year earlier.
India Office Action
Keppel’s disposal of One Paramount comes as Temasek stablemate CapitaLand Investment on Thursday announced the first-ever divestment by its flagship India REIT.
CapitaLand India Trust is selling two IT parks, CyberVale in Chennai and CyberPearl in Hyderabad, to an unrelated third party for a total of INR 11 billion ($124.4 million), marking CLINT’s inaugural disposal since listing in 2007.
Another Singaporean state giant, GIC, has set up a partnership with Canadian asset manager Brookfield to own and manage three India office properties with a total value of $1 billion, market sources confirmed to Mingtiandi this week.
The seed assets of the partnership are Brookfield’s Equinox office park in Mumbai and two GIC-owned properties at Bhartiya City in Bengaluru and Phoenix Aquila in Hyderabad, the sources said.
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