Image Credits : DNA

Now the overseas firms such as; APG, a Dutch Pension Fund Manager and Warburg Pincus, a US Buyout Group are looking for an opportunity to invest in the Indian warehouses with a hope to cash the demand for efficient and modern storage space as in past few years Indian has recorded great book in online shopping.

Godowns vs Warehouses:

In present the country’s logistics and warehousing sector is stretched to $ 110 billion as more and more Indians are coming online for shopping and other activities. Existing spaces, which was famous with a name “Godowns”, a low rise sheds with poor infrastructure and ventilation to ward off heat and dust are too old and out of dated for the retail giant such as; Amazon.com and its core rival Flipkart or Snapdeal. According to experts retailers never prefer to use these Godowns because on these places goods frequently get spoil or soiled. Apart from that now e-tailers are looking for the way to move their goods swiftly with minimal damage and due to that they demands for climate control, levelled loading bays, fire sprinkler systems and paved roads to warehouses. If you have existing warehouse, so after adding these facilities you can lift the rents by up to 20 percent, as per the statement of the JLL, a real estate firm.

Growth in e-commerce sector:

According to Ben Salmon, Head of Singapore-Based Assetz Property Group, “We have got many people around us who have bags of money, but not that much assets”. The more he added that Assetz Property Group has raised $ 50 million from Asian investors with an aim to buy warehouses on Indian soil. Meanwhile, e-commerce sector in India is booming and it is expected that by the end of 2025 the market will grow in terms of value of goods sold will be about by $ 220 billion and it is expected that for this years the value of goods sold will be $ 11 billion, as per the reports of Bank of America Merrill Lynch. Demand of these kinds of warehouses is good news for property developers in India as most of the real estate developers are doing business with high debt and struggling with sluggish residential sales. For the duration of 2009 to 2011, the office leasing was slower.

As per the estimates of JLL India, to satisfy the above requirements, the supply of modern warehouses in India can be get double by 2020 with 200 million square feet space, which will be fuelled by online retailers as they have already taken up 20 percent of the space in the first half of 2015. The more demand will push the rents which are about 156 rupees ($2.34) a square foot a year in some city outskirts, but this rent can go up by the 20 percent, as per analysts. Whereas; in present, the average annual returns In UK for industrial assets are expected to be 10 percent by next five years, as per the reports of Colliers International, a real estate firm.

Needed facilities in warehouses:

In New Delhi, there are many steel-framed, large and modern warehouses, which have ventilation as well as 24 hour security, but retailers and logistics firms are line up to serve the country’s capital. Amazon is one among other retailers, who want to own large, modern, white and red warehouse as Godowns are increasing their size from family garage to a basketball court. It is noted that Amazon India has leased more than 20 fulfillment warehouse centers where company is used to store goods and packs the orders from many different landlords. However; still company is looking for bigger, modern spaces with the average size of 200,000 square feet.

The e-commerce has attracted more than $ 1.5 billion through private equity funds since year 2011, as per the data of Venture Intelligence. Whereas; Embassy Group and Warburg are jointly planning to invest $ 250 million to lease, operate and build a portfolio of up to 20 million square feet of warehouses in next 5 to 7 years, as per the statement of Anshul Singhal, CEO of Joint Venture and Embassy Industrial Parks.

According to Sachin Doshi, Head of its private real estate investments in Asia Pacific, “APG is also looking for a local partner who can invest in the build logistics parks in India”. No doubt there are some basic challenges for investors who want to acquire land as ownership cannot be disputed. Major real estate developers like; Assetz is betting on buying larger existing warehouses in the market rather than building warehouses from the scratch. After previous investments, now Assetz is planning to raise $ 100 million to buy 10 million square feet of warehouses space.

Global Rentals Chart

Owing to a vigorous demand from start-ups and e-commerce business, office rentals in major cities of India are experiencing a significant surge. The rising appetite for Indian commercial properties is attributed to about 67% of investments flowing into Indian real estate market from overseas which has been noted to be the highest among all other countries.

Indian cities of Mumbai, Delhi and Bangaluru have topped the global commercial property market with regards to annual rental yields as demand for commercial spaces has picked up in recent times. While Bengaluru topped the list with 10.5% annual yield, other cities like New York, Singapore, London, Tokyo and Hong Kong ranged between 2.9% and 7%, indicates a global survey of property consultant Knight Frank. Mumbai and Bengaluru have also featured among the list of top 5 global cities for future rental growth and the anticipated growth is nearly 22% and 16% for both cities respectively.

Currently, these cities are facing severe paucity of good quality office space in the face of strong demand which is creating an upward pressure on office rentals that is expected to scale up in the range of 6-7% in the next six months year-on year,” says Samantak Das, Chief Economist & National Director of Research, Knight Frank India.

Although the aggregate vacancy level of commercial spaces is at 17%, occupiers and investors are facing a challenge in procuring quality office spaces across prime business districts in the country where vacancy is in single digits.

The Indian commercial real estate sector is making a comeback after experiencing massive slump for over three years.  With a healthy pipeline and recent large ticket transactions, early signs of revival are being observed.

Big corporate occupiers are returning to the market hinting at an improved business sentiment. Bengaluru and Mumbai have been leading with these large transactions.   In May this year, while Tata Consultancy Services leased over two million sq ft of built-to suit space at Hiranandani Estate in Thane in Mumbai, Flipkart hired a 2-million sq ft custom-built office campus in Bengaluru.

E-commerce companies Flipkart, amazon

As we all know that e-commerce industry is changing the way of traditional shopping and helping the Indian economy to grow. Online shopping has given a fresh lease of  life to hundreds of land owners because leading e-commerce companies are planning to buy the land to build their own warehouses. But earlier it was not possible due to tight FDI policies for multi-brand retail business. Amazon, the American online retail giant has announced the war chest of $2 billion for India when Flipkart raised $1 billion in a fresh round of funding. All the leading e-commerce companies have begun a massive hunt for warehousing facilities in all over the country.

One side Amazon is planning to lease more than million square feet of warehousing space in current year to set-up fulfillment centers and other side Flipkart has recently leased 500,000 square feet of warehousing space across the country and it is expected that these warehouse facilities will commission before November 2015. According to one of property consultant who has knowledge about Flipkart’s plans, “To kill the competition Flipkart wants to gear up its supply chain before Diwali rush, however it is also equivalent of the Christmas sale season in the US when players like Amazon do a big chunk of their business”. All major Indian online retailers have already sounded out property consultants for their plan to lease 2 million sq ft of warehouses before the Diwali of current year. It is expected that these space will be leased by April 2015 and will be ready for operation by July 2015, just before festive season, as per the statement of consultant.

The recent policy on FDI in multi-brand retail didn’t find many takers and eventually it became a non-starter because of stiff local sourcing and upfront investment norms. In December 2014, Amazon had announced that they are going to set-up five more fulfillments in all over India including Delhi, Chennai, Jaipur, Ahmedabad and outskirts of Gurgaon to cover Noida. Currently, they have existing facilities in the outskirts of Mumbai and Bangalore, it has almost doubled its total storage capacity to over half million square feet. According to property experts, Amazon has already leased more than 250,000 sq ft of space in Bhiwandi near Mumbai and 16,000 sq ft of warehousing space in Delhi’s Mohan Cooperative. And now Amazon is looking for more space in other part of country.

Plan of Amazon, Snapdeal and Flipkart for their warehouses:

An official spokeswoman of Amazon said, “According to our company policy, we never comment on what we may or may not do in the future. CBRE which did the Mohan Cooperative deal declined to comment, whereas; JLL, which did the Bhiwandi deal too declined to comment”. But the property consultant quoted before few months that Amazon is looking at warehousing space in Chennai, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Jaipur, Ludhiana, and another one in the NCR near Gurgaon.

According to Rohit Bansal, the co-founder and chief operating officer (CEO) of Snapdeal.com, “We are looking at building 500,000 sq ft of warehousing space in the next one year”.

Flipkart is also looking for new space in new cities such as; Ahmedabad, Chennai Hyderabad and Kochi to expand its presence through warehouse facilities. Finding quality warehousing space, however, is a tough task, especially if companies are looking outside of the NCR and Mumbai towards smaller centers.

According to Nirav Kothary, Head in Industrial Services Department at property consultancy JLL, “Real estate developers in Mumbai and NCR have matured enough and are building warehouses with specifications matching international company requirements and now they are ready to catch-up in other cities”. The cities such as; Hyderabad, Jaipur, Lucknow, Bangalore, Chennai and others the bulk of the large deals are for built-to-suit warehouses, stated Anckur Srivasttava, chairman of GenReal Property Advisers who is working with few of the online retailers to lock-in space.

According to the estimate of real estate experts, about 70 per cent of the investment by these ecommerce companies are going to set-up the back-end infrastructure which will include the warehouse and logistics facilities.