Reading: Europa in pole for Arlington Business Parks Partnership

Europa Capital is in pole position to buy the Arlington Business Parks Partnership, which comprises a number of business parks across the UK, for significantly in excess of the £475 million guide price.

Goodman and Legal & General Property brought to market the remaining UK office campuses in their Arlington Business Parks Partnership fund seeking offers in November via Strutt & Parker and Cushman & Wakefield.

Europa is understood to have seen off Fortress Investment Group. Other parties to have bid include Tristan Capital, XLB with Harbert, Ares and Greenoak.

The assets are:

• 340,000 sq ft spread across 23 buildings at Oxford Business Park. Average rents are around £20 per sq ft with the most recent prelet at a new 40,000 sq ft building to AC Neilsen at £25 per sq ft.
• 2 and 3 Arlington Square, Bracknell which comprises 155,000 sq ft over two buildings principally let to Regus at circa £20 per sq ft. The campus includes two acres of development land.
• 50 acres of development land at sites in Aberdeen, Reading, Bristol and Solent Business Park.
• Uxbridge Business Park comprising five buildings including two new speculative developments. Tenants at the park paying rents at between £28 and £30 per sq ft include Amgen and Bristol-Myers Squibb. Quoting rents on the new space are around £35 per sq ft.
• Hammersmith Embankment in west London. The site comprises office blocks – Waterfront and Riverside - totalling 160,000 sq ft as well as one acre of development land. Riverside is a five-storey 67,000 sq ft office, until recently the headquarters of Rapp Collins, being sold with vacant possession. The 92,000 sq ft Waterfront on Manbre Road is multilet at an average rent of around £42 per sq ft to tenants including Betfair, Ancestry.com and Fulham Reach.
• Manchester Business Park comprising 189,000 sq ft across four buildings leased to tenants including Emirates, Costain, Regus and PZ Cuzzons next to Manchester City Airport.
• 220,000 sq ft of offices at Gloucester Business Park principally leased to the defence industry at average rents of around £16 per sq ft. Recent lettings have been secured at circa £19 per sq ft. The site also includes significant development land.

ABPP was launched by Legal & General Property and Goodman in 2003 to invest in, develop and manage business parks across the UK, with good accessibility to large metropolitan areas. At the end of December 2011, ABPP was valued at £1.1 billion.

At that stage the fund comprised 20 business parks throughout key regional UK office markets, with a geographic weighting bias towards the South East.

Credit: CoStar