Nigel Hugill and Robin Butler have established Urban&Civic, a UK real estate firm backed by private equity house GI Partners.
GI Partners recently closed its third fund, GI Partners Fund III, raising USD1.9bn. This fund will provide the investment capital for Urban&Civic. Sources close to the deal indicated that GI would be prepared to invest up to GBP150m.
Urban&Civic will target strategic land and estate acquisitions of metropolitan or regional scale capable of sustaining new or improved places and environments.
The first investment being made by Urban&Civic is in the former Alconbury Airfield, covering 1,100 acres, 24 miles west of Cambridge and 60 miles north of London, close to Huntingdon in Cambridgeshire. The property was commissioned as an American airbase during the Second World War and was declared surplus to requirements by the Ministry of Defence in March 1995. The existing estate comprises over 100 buildings, ranging across industrial and aircraft hangers, warehousing, office and fuel stores. Current gross income totals approximately GBP2.3m. The purchase consideration, including adjoining land, is GBP27.5m.
The Huntingdon area is one of the wealthiest and most commercially active in the UK. Over the past ten years employment levels in the Huntingdonshire district have increased by 26 per cent – among the largest improvements in the country.
Urban&Civic is working on a pipeline of other prospective acquisitions and expects to make further announcements in due course.
Hugill (pictured left, with Butler) says: “We have been working closely with GI for some months and are delighted to be able to announce their backing to Urban&Civic simultaneously with our first investment. Alconbury absolutely represents starting as we mean to go on. The site has been recognised as a key strategic location through the planning enquiry. The challenge now is to garner support for the right mix of ongoing uses – very much as we have been able to achieve in the past. We are looking to put together, perhaps, five or six acquisitions of similar scale and potential. GI are knowledgeable investors who understand our model fully and share our aspirations. It just feels like a very good time to come together.”
Mark Tagliaferri, managing director of GI Partners, says: "We are delighted to be working with Nigel and Robin backing the Urban&Civic platform. Their long track record of success, combined with their strategic vision of opportunities in the current market dislocation make them an ideal partner for GI Partners. Alconbury Airfield is a perfect first acquisition to deploy the team’s skills and vision and we are excited by the prospect of supporting Urban&Civic as the business makes further acquisitions.”
