Real Estate Boom

South-East Asia’s smitten, too

Though the exact value of the total real estate projects planned in India is not available, if you go by the number of projects lined up by companies from different parts of world, firms from southeast Asian countries such as Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia seem to have cast a lusty eye on India.According to the Knight Frank India Research data, eight of the 13 residential projects proposed by foreign players in India are by companies in the southeast Asian region. Players from the US, UK, Middle East, Canada and Japan have floated one project each.“Southeast Asia nations, especially Singapore, are very bullish on Indian real estate sector. The main reasons for this is the proximity of these nations to India and the similarly in their markets. Also, Singapore firms are putting in huge funds into India because their real estate market has almost saturated and India is one of the lucrative options for them,” says Trammell Crow Meghraj managing director Anuj Puri.According to A T Kearney’s Global Investor Confidence Survey 2004, India has been ranked the third most favoured destination for FDI after China and the US.A report brought by property consultant Knight Frank reveals this soaring investor confidence in India is also reflected in the real estate sector. In less than a year since the liberation of FDI norms, overseas investors are flocking to tap the latent potential in India.
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Southeast Asian players also dominate investment in IT parks, SEZ and infrastructure projects. Singapore-based Ascendas India has developed the International Tech Parks in Bangalore, Gurgoan, Hyderabad and Chennai, and acquired the Vanenburg IT park in Hyderabad from its original promoters. The company now plans to develop IT parks in Pune and Kolkata. Indonesia’s Universal Success Enterprise Ltd has signed a memorandum with Delhi-based developers Unitech Ltd for developing an IT park in Kolkata. Of the two foreign firms which have evinced interest in setting up SEZs in India, one is from Singapore (SembCorp Engineers and Constructors Pte Ltd) and the other is Houston-based Hines. [DNA]