ICG puts foot on the gas with Jaguar Land Rover campus
Intermediate Capital Group’s sale and leaseback fund has agreed to forward fund a 2.9m sq ft logistics centre for Jaguar Land Rover, at Mercia Park in Leicestershire.
The deal comes after a rival bid early last year from Korea Investment & Securities reportedly tallied around £300m before the agreement fell through.
It is understood that the pricing on this latest deal, which was not disclosed, exceeded this amount.
Intermediate Capital Group’s sale and leaseback fund has agreed to forward fund a 2.9m sq ft logistics centre for Jaguar Land Rover, at Mercia Park in Leicestershire.
The deal comes after a rival bid early last year from Korea Investment & Securities reportedly tallied around £300m before the agreement fell through.
It is understood that the pricing on this latest deal, which was not disclosed, exceeded this amount.
The deal is thought to represent the largest ever single occupier build-to-suit deal. ICG is partnering with developer IM Properties to deliver the scheme on 20-year leases for each of the five units on the campus.
Those units will be completed on a phased basis until September 2022.
Jaguar will use the distribution centre to serve 80 countries in its network.
Chris Nichols, head of sale and leaseback at ICG, said: “This is a landmark deal by ICG, and the biggest single-occupier logistics build-to-suit ever undertaken in Europe. Successfully completing this transaction reflects our ability to source truly mission-critical real estate in very competitive spheres.
“The fund is actively seeking new mission-critical real estate investment opportunities across Europe. We anticipate making additional investments by the end of Q1 2021, by which time we expect to have acquired circa €1bn of mission critical investments in the UK, Germany, France, the Netherlands, Spain and Northern Europe.”
Kevin Ashfield, UK development director at IM Properties, said that infrastructure works on the project are now largely complete, with construction set to begin.
ICG launched its sale and leaseback strategy in 2019. It said it expected market growth to remain “significant” as businesses “come to appreciate the opportunity to utilise their real estate for balance sheet optimisation purposes”.
It also highlighted that the economic climate and the need for corporate liquidity will drive “significant short-term market growth for sale and leaseback as an alternate form of finance”.
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Image © Xinhua/Shutterstock
