Lazada One Office Bldg May Soon Have A New Owner
SINGAPORE – Top executives from Lazada One’s joint owners, ARA Asset Management and Chelsfield, have verified that they have received offers from multinational investors keen to acquire the newly upgraded commercial property, reported Mingtiandi on Tuesday morning (19 April, SGT).
“We have strong interest in the asset from a selection of investors,” Chelsfield Asia’s CEO Nick Loup said in an exclusive interview with the news outlet before the Easter holiday.
He added that offers were being fielded “from global investors looking at core to other substantial professional investors from the region as well.” While Loup didn’t specify any pricing details, he stated that the sale was nearing a final result.
Just last week, Alibaba’s subsidiary Lazada officially opened its new headquarters at the 11-storey office building located in 51 Bras Basah Road, with insiders disclosing that the owners are asking for S$800 million (US$588 million) for the commercial property.
This works out to about S$3,077 based on the office building’s overall built area of 260,000 sq ft and represents a 44 percent premium from the S$555.5 million originally paid by ARA and Chelsfield to acquire the property in 2019.
Since Lazada and Alibaba announced that they had agreed to lease 140,000 sq ft in the building at a rate of about S$8 psf per month in January 2021, the office building has drawn several tech firms to take up space there. These tenants – which include fashion retailer Zalora and music streaming giant Spotify, in addition to coworking space provider JustCo – helped push up the property’s occupancy rate to 95 percent.
The robust leasing demand for Lazada One is due to upgrades done to the commercial property, specifically, enhancements to efficiency systems and environmental controls that enabled the office building to secure a Platinum certification under Singapore’s Green Mark system for eco-friendly buildings.
“Bigger tenants usually have bigger requirements so if a building is not green, it will significantly affect the pool of potential tenants. Tenants are also becoming more cognizant of the fact that office buildings with well-designed technology can save cost in the long run,” added Wilson Lai, Head of investments at ARA Asset Management.
Apart from boosting sustainability, the landlords also invested in renovating Lazada One’s public areas and redesigning the lower floor space to enable direct linkage to both the Bras Basah MRT Station and the Bencoolen MRT Station.
