RMZ Group

The country’s office space market is experiencing a major boom with commercial real estate transactions of nearly $3 billion recorded during the last calendar year. In a series of high profile office space deals of large global investors like Blackstone, GIC of Singapore, Brookfield Asset Management, Canadian Pension Plan Investment Board and Middle East sovereign funds have chased down transaction opportunities. The latest is Bangaluru based RMZ group which has acquired Essar’s Equinox biz Park in Bandra-Kurla Complex in Mumbai.

India’s large grade-A office buildings, riding on a robust services economy, have returned stable yields to investors in an otherwise volatile real estate market.

In a latest, Southern real estate major RMZ Corp has acquired Equinox Business Park, owned by billionaire brothers Shashi and Ravi Ruia of Essar, in Mumbai for Rs 2400 crore. RMZ, in which Qatar Investment Authority is an investor, is said to have paid Rs 19,000 per sq ft for the deal.

RMZ has a target of acquiring 80 million sq ft of rent-yielding office space in the next five years across India’s top cities. This puts RMZ and Qatar combine in direct race with cross-town rival Embassy Office Parks to emerge as the country’s top office landlord. Private equity giant Blackstone Group owns 50% stake in Embassy Office Parks.

The biggest acquisition in Indian office space market is for Rs. 2,050 crore by Brookfield for the majority control in six parks in Unitech Corporate Parks, NCR and Kolkata.  It also paid an undisclosed amount to buy Unitech’s 40% holdings.

Embassy Office Parks acquired Vrindavan Tech Village in Bangalore for Rs 1,950 crore, which is also counted among the other big deals in the commercial space market.