Allianz Real Estate Names Danny Phuan Head of Acquisitions for APAC

One of Asia’s most prolific acquirers of real estate has procured new leadership for its acquisition efforts as Allianz Real Estate adds former Keppel Capital executive Danny Phuan to its team in Singapore.

Phuan joined the property investment division of the European investment giant on 2 December as Asia Pacific Head of Acquisitions, taking up the newly created role to strengthen the firm’s presence and acquisition capabilities in Asia Pacific, according to an Allianz spokesperson.

Allianz’ hire of Phuan, who previously spent more than 14 years with Keppel Capital in Shanghai and Singapore, comes as the European company continues to build its team amid a multi-billion dollar Asia real estate investment campaign that has seen it make major purchases in China, Japan, Singapore and India in recent months.

Building a Team to Do More Deals

“Danny’s extensive experience in the industry, coupled with his strong track record, makes him the ideal candidate to oversee the sourcing and execution of transactions across the region,” Rushabh Desai, Asia-Pacific CEO of Allianz Real Estate said. “The addition of Danny to our leadership team in Asia-Pacific comes at an opportune time as we continue to further our business expansion plans in this region.”

In his new role, Phuan will be reporting to Desai, who set up Allianz Real Estate’s beach head in Singapore just over three years ago.

The €67.1 billion ($74.67 billion) real estate investment and asset management wing of the Allianz Group portrayed Phuan’s hire as another step towards reaching its target of having allocated 10 percent of its global real estate assets in Asia Pacific. In recent weeks the company also added former Apollo Global Management executive Patrick Kuo as a senior director with its China team, and brought over former JLL APAC research head Megan Walters as its new global head of research in October.

From Deal Partners to Colleagues

Before joining Allianz Real Estate, Phuan held the position of Chief Investment Officer for North Asia at Keppel Capital, the asset management division of state-backed Keppel Corporation and parent organisation of private fund management specialist Alpha Investment Partners.

Alpha and Keppel have been frequent investment partners for Allianz Real Estate since the European giant began ramping up its investment in the region, with funds managed by Alpha Investment Partners teaming up with Allianz in October to invest €1 billion to purchase a Beijing commercial project from developer D&J China.

In December of last year Allianz also paid S$537.3 million (then $392.1 million) to buy 20 percent of Singapore’s Ocean Financial Centre from Keppel REIT. That deal in the Southeast Asian hub came just three months after Keppel Capital’s Alpha Asia Macro Trends Fund III had joined with Allianz and an unnamed third investor to pay $90 million to buy an office park asset in Shanghai from CITIC Capital.