The Wing Shing Industrial Building was previously owned by Tang Shing-bor’s family
Warburg Pincus-backed fund manager Kailong Group has begun its conversion of a Hong Kong industrial building into a cold chain logistics centre after acquiring the property last year from the family of late “Shop King” Tang Shing-bor.
Kailong and its partner, Reitar Logtech Group, expect the building at 26 Wing Kei Road in the Kwai Chung area of the New Territories to be the largest automated cold chain warehouse in Hong Kong, with a total floor area of over 200,000 square feet (18,581 square metres), upon completion in the second half of 2024.
The transformation of the Wing Shing Industrial Building will feature innovative technologies such as efficient refrigeration and freezing equipment, intelligent real-time monitoring, and control and adjustment systems to enable fully automated operations, Kailong said Monday in a release.
“As a real estate private equity fund focusing on Greater China, Kailong Group currently holds seven real estate projects in Hong Kong, and this project is the group’s fourth industrial project in Hong Kong,” said Ivan Ho, Kailong’s CEO for Hong Kong and China. “In the future, Kailong will focus on investing in industrial conversion and redevelopment projects, including logistics warehouses, cold chain warehouse, and data centre.”
Maiden Partnership
The conversion of the 1980s-era industrial building marks the first collaboration in the field of smart logistics between Kailong and Hong Kong-based Reitar Logtech, a warehouse-focused asset manager led by chairman and CEO John Chan.
Ivan Ho, Kailong’s CEO for Hong Kong and China, preaching the cold chain gospel at the event
The partners have enlisted Kamui Construction & Engineering Group as the main contractor on the redevelopment and SmartMore as the IT architect of the project’s smart logistics systems.
Due to increasing appetite for frozen food and insufficient equipment in Hong Kong, Reitar expects to develop multiple large-scale automated cold chain centres locally in the next three years to meet market demand.
“The group will continue to maintain a close working relationship with Kailong Group and hopes to build a cold chain asset network in Hong Kong in the future,” Chan said.
Tang Family Cast-Offs
The Wing Shing Industrial Building, which stands 11 storeys high on Wing Kei Road, is located less than 10 minutes’ drive from Kwai Fong MTR station.
Kailong acquired ownership of 90 percent of the space in the building for a reported HK$433 million ($55.1 million) in mid-2022 as the Tang family’s 20th major asset sale of that year, according to a Mingtiandi tally.
The deal also represented the Tangs’ second disposal of an industrial asset in Kwai Chung after Australian developer Goodman agreed to purchase a building in the same area for a reported HK$520 million from Stan Group, which is controlled by Stan Tang, the youngest son of the late patriarch.
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