Colliers International and FirstService Real Estate Advisors said they will combine their operations, making the newly formed company the third-largest provider of commercial real estate services worldwide.
The company, which will operate as Colliers International, will have more than 15,000 employees in 480 offices in 61 countries, Colliers and FirstService REA said on Monday. With US$1.9 billion in annual revenue worldwide, Colliers will rank behind CB Richard Ellis Group Inc and Jones Lang LaSalle Inc, and ahead of Cushman & Wakefield, the firm said.
FirstService REA owns about 70 per cent of Colliers International, with the rest held by its local brokers, said Dylan Taylor, president and chief executive officer of FirstService REA. He will become president and CEO of Colliers International in the US after the merger. The company will be based in Seattle.
Commercial real estate prices, leasing and sales have been slumping. US commercial property values declined in October to the lowest level in more than seven years, Moody’s Investors Service Inc said last month. Office vacancies may approach 20 per cent this year as employers hold off hiring, Jones Lang LaSalle and Grubb & Ellis Co said in November.
‘We’re a bit contrarian in that we see a tremendous opportunity to grow in this environment,’ Mr Taylor said on Monday in an interview. The company is benefiting from the ‘best recruiting pipeline’ it’s ever had, and probably will make ‘further strategic investments in the US’, he said. ‘I would anticipate our growth model not only continuing, but I would expect it accelerating.’
FirstService REA is a unit of publicly traded FirstService Corp, based in Toronto. FirstService REA has been expanding since 2004, buying controlling stakes in FirstService PGP Property Valuation, PKF Hotel and Hospitality Consulting, MHPM Project Leaders and FirstService Williams, the brokerage hub in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut.
Source: Business Times, 6 Jan 2010
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