Tony Smedley speaks about the fund's plan to raise new capital to help fund an investment pipeline of around EUR150m.

Growing online sales will not deter retailer’s physical store expansion plans in 2016, reports CBRE in its seventh edition of “How Active Are Retailers Globally?”, a study of  over a 150 major international brands based in Americas, Asia Pacific and Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA).

"With the start of the Six Nations Championship, we decided to take a timely comparative analysis of the prime capital city residential performance for each of the competing nations", Knight Frank says.

Jones Lang LaSalle appointed by Gemalto to advise on worldwide real estate operations

Global tenants and owner occupiers will get a chance to rate SA's commercial and industrial property sectors against 46 world cities with the release of international brokerage firm CBRE's latest research, which includes Johannesburg property markets.

The report released by global property consultancy Knight Frank LLP, shows that South African buyers outperformed buyers from far wealthier countries such as Germany, Singapore, Saudi Arabia, Switzerland and Canada over the past 3 years. 

Cell C, South Africa’s third Cellular operator is going to be a tenant in 960 towers that they used to own! Huh? It true, it’s called a sale-leaseback and represents an approach that may interest you

Africa's infrastructure problem is not caused by a scarcity of money

ALTX-listed distributor of tower cranes SA French’s profit fell in the year to June, knocked down by costs of expansion and acquisitions of additional units to meet an upsurge in demand in the rental market.

The costs were associated with new branches opened early this year in Cape Town and Durban as well as finance charges linked to the acquisition of additional units for the rental market.

Net profit fell to R6,9m compared with R12,7m in the previous year and headline earnings per share dropped to 4,68c from 10,12c. Revenue increased 25,7% to R152m from R121m while operating profit declined 36,8% to R12,9m.

The company’s gross profit margin decreased 2,7% from 25,2% to 22,5%, which it said was largely because of currency volatility.

CEO Quentin van Breda said the results were “satisfactory” despite “challenging” market conditions.

He the said opening of new branches and the acquisition of the new fleet was a capital intensive exercise that required a substantial investment on the company's part.

While developing infrastructure was costly and the initial costs were in most cases once off, management felt strongly that it was necessary to establish a national presence.

Van Breda said most of the expenses were budgeted for and SA French expected the investment to pay dividends in both the short and long term. “It is, however, undoubtedly the correct route to follow and as an emerging business model it will certainly generate substantial future cash flows,” he said.

“Despite challenging market conditions we have delivered satisfactory maiden results. We can now boast the biggest and most comprehensive tower crane rental fleet in Africa. The benefits and annuity income generated by a new fleet of tower cranes with an average lifespan of 20 years are undeniable.”

The company had to acquire new rental units after a spike in demand for crane rentals as a result of the uncertainty caused by the electricity shortages, the company said.

The electricity supply crisis earlier this year caused uncertainty for many of its key clients in the construction industry. This resulted in delays in the awarding of several infrastructure projects and construction companies responded by restricting or delaying capital expenditure decisions such as the purchase of tower cranes, it said.

“This change in market dynamic resulted in a change of focus in SA French’s business. The group has experienced an increase in demand for crane rentals as many of its clients were seeking to keep costs variable until there was certainty on power supply,” SA French said.

Construction company Group Five announced that its infrastructure concessions business, intertoll, was part of a consortium that had been awarded the R11 billion M6 Phase 3 Motorway Project in Hungary.

Intertoll held 10% of the concession company and would lead the operations and maintenance activities for the project, it said.

Revenue was expected to start flowing through to Intertoll from the beginning of next year, with full-scale operations beginning in 2010.

Intertoll’s partners on the project are Strabag of Germany, France’s Colas and John Laing Infrastructure from the UK.

The 78km dual carriageway project includes the construction and maintenance of 55 structures and four tunnels totalling more than 3km. The 30-year concession project reached financial close on November 21.

Intertoll was part of Group Five’s infrastructure concessions business and offers toll system design, procurement, implementation and operation, together with related services such as routine road maintenance.

The business has equity interests in two other service concessions in Eastern Europe and operates toll roads in SA.

“Since joining the European Union in 2004, the transit traffic through Hungary from Romania and Bulgaria has increased more than 30%.

Hungary has ambitious plans to develop its road infrastructure under an aggressive timeline, and the M6 Phase 3 is an important part of this plan,” said head of Group Five Infrastructure Concessions Eric Vemer.

Vemer said that the project reinforced and added depth to Intertoll’s position in Hungary and the group’s growing profile in eastern Europe.

The project was tendered and closed in record time, with pre-qualifications announced in May, tenders submitted in September, the preferred bidder chosen in October and financial closure last month.

Group Five last month said it had further expanded its manufacturing and construction materials portfolio by acquiring Bernoberg, a small niche manufacturer of cement extender, for R32m.

Early this year, the group said that it planned to increase its revenue from R5,8 billion to R7,3 billion by the end of the 2008 financial year next June.