Mayland and the new deal

Managing the way ahead

The experience that Mayland Real Estate has gained from projects in locations such as Gdynia (the Wzgórze shopping centre) and Słupsk (the Jantar shopping centre), is a strong basis to build a facility management department servicing other companies. The company currently manages five shopping centres: Karolinka in Opole (70,000 sqm), Pogoria in Dąbrowa Górnicza (37,000 sqm), Jantar in Słupsk (46,000 sqm), Wzgórze in Gdynia (70,000 sqm) and Fort Wola in Warsaw (30,000 sqm); but it is to start an offensive this spring to extend its management offer for retail facilities. "We have the experience needed to offer such services. The redevelopment of the Wzgórze shopping centre in Gdynia has been very complicated because we were operating on a ?living' entity: during the redevelopment the centre hasn't been closed but open as usual. Importantly, construction work is proceeding on schedule and should be completed before the end of the year. We operated in a similar way on the Jantar shopping centre in Słupsk, which we redeveloped, successfully exchanging a Real hypermarket with an Intermarché. We are also introducing a Media Market and two large shops into the mall - a sports and a furniture store, which will enrich the offer of the centre," says Maciej Kiełbicki, the managing director of Mayland Real Estate.

Focus on Warsaw

The list of projects in the company's development pipeline begins with the Serenada shopping centre in Kraków (42,000 sqm of leasable space), for which all the administrative procedures have been completed. "The facility is app. 45 pct leased and negotiations with banks are at an advanced stage. Tender procedures for individual packages of construction work will start in the middle of the year," adds Maciej Kiełbicki. The next projects on the company's schedule are Aleja Słońca in Szczecin, Idylla in Wrocław and the design of the Bella Dolina shopping centre in Rzeszów. But Mayland also has its eyes on Warsaw, where it owns a number of properties, such as a plot in Czerniaków near Trasa Siekierkowska and the already existing Fort Wola shopping centre. "We are looking for passive investors and other developers for the planned Libretto centre in Czerniaków. It will involve the construction of a retail facility, but will also include offices - a sector that Mayland RE has not previously been involved in. There will also be apartments in later stages of the development. We are currently working on permits for the projects, which could take some time because there is no zoning plan in place," adds Maciej Kiełbicki. Another project in the pipeline is the redevelopment of Fort Wola on ul. Połczyńska in the city's western Wola district, which was opened in 2001. "It has a very good location, near post-industrial areas which are currently being transformed. We want to use this potential and modernise the centre," adds the managing director of Mayland Real Estate.

A freer market

Interestingly, the company is not ruling out other project development models from those it has employed so far."We will continue our earlier strategy with regard to our own projects. We will prepare a centre for the launch of the construction work, next we will look for backing from a bank, and then we sell the project to an SPV company in which Mayland is a minority shareholder while a passive investor is the dominant one. They will have the guarantee that due to Mayland's involvement, the project will be completed, the mall will be opened, and we will manage it," explains Maciej Kiełbicki. The company is also looking for new properties and to focus on extending its development activities, but based on a slightly different model than the one mentioned before. "This usually takes place with the significant financial involvement of a developer, which buys the plot and invests substantially in the enterprise. However, the current market makes it possible for us to invest financially to a lesser degree and form partnerships with the owners of other projects. There could be different models for new locations. We could enter into cooperation with land owners or the owners of poorly functioning malls as a minority shareholder and a developer at the same time. In this way we would make the project credible in the eyes of financial institutions. This is important because there are investors on the market who were not properly prepared for developing shopping centres, even though they have started to do so. It is no longer sufficient to just have a plot in a good location. This is a time for greater professionalisation," claims Maciej Kiełbicki.