Skip to main content

Advertisement

Advertisement

Rowsley sinks S$373m in Yangon project

SINGAPORE — Rowsley, a Singapore-listed real estate, architectural and engineering consultancy firm partly owned by billionaire Peter Lim, is making its first foray into Myanmar by investing US$275 million (S$373 million) in a mixed-use property project in Yangon.

SINGAPORE — Rowsley, a Singapore-listed real estate, architectural and engineering consultancy firm partly owned by billionaire Peter Lim, is making its first foray into Myanmar by investing US$275 million (S$373 million) in a mixed-use property project in Yangon.

Under the agreement signed yesterday, Rowsley will take a 50 per cent stake in a company that wholly owns HAGL Myanmar Centre, one of the country’s largest integrated projects with four office blocks, a five-star hotel, retail mall and serviced as well as residential apartments.

Rowsley’s partner in the project is Vietnam’s Hoang Anh Gia Lai Joint Stock Company (HAGL), which is undertaking the construction of the project.

“Yangon faces a severe shortage of top-grade office space, hotels and modern malls. The first phase of HAGL Myanmar Centre will be operational in 2015 and will address acute shortage of real estate in all these asset classes,” Rowsley CEO Lock Wai Han said.

Spread over more than 780,000 sq ft of land located in a prime neighbourhood next to Inya Lake in Yangon, HAGL Myanmar Centre has a lease term of 50 years and options for extensions, with the project valued at US$550 million upon completion.

It will have a total net gross floor area of almost 6.9 million sq ft when completed in 2018, comprising both residential and commercial components, Rowsley said.

The first phase of the development, started two years ago and targeted for completion by the end of the year, includes two office blocks with a net lettable area of about 870,000 sq ft, a retail mall of about 420,000 sq ft and a 400-room five-star hotel.

The second phase, comprising another two office blocks with a net lettable area exceeding 1 million sq ft and more than 1,000 serviced apartments and residential units, is expected to start next year.

Although Myanmar has registered strong economic growth in recent years after emerging from decades of isolation, the International Monetary Fund warned this week that the economy is set to grow at a slower pace of 7.8 percent in the fiscal year ending March 31 largely because of a slowdown in agriculture. CHANNEL NEWSASIA

Read more of the latest in

Advertisement

Advertisement

Stay in the know. Anytime. Anywhere.

Subscribe to get daily news updates, insights and must reads delivered straight to your inbox.

By clicking subscribe, I agree for my personal data to be used to send me TODAY newsletters, promotional offers and for research and analysis.