Noteworthy Work
K&L Gates Advises Real I.S. Australia on Sale of Geosciences Building
Sydney – Global law firm K&L Gates has advised Real I.S., a German real estate investment fund manager, on the sale of the Geosciences Australia property to funds managed by Charter Hall for A$363.5 million.
The deal sets a record for the highest sale price of any office building in the Australian Capital Territory.
The K&L Gates team that advised Real I.S. was led by Sydney-based real estate partner Samuel Brown and investment funds partner Kane Barnett. The global team consisted of funds graduate lawyers Cathy Ma and Bernard Sia, real estate senior associate Karen Yuan and lawyer Reilly King, banking and finance special counsel Harsharan Gill and lawyer Nam Nguyen, tax special counsel Leslie Petro and graduate lawyer Mary Howie. The Australian team was supported on foreign law issues by New York-based partner Anthony Nolan and Munich-based partners Hilger von Livonius, Volker Gattringer and Martina Ortner, associate Richard Resch and lawyer Deborah Shelton.
Brown said: "We are pleased to continue to support Real I.S. with its major transactions in Australia. As well as our local support on negotiations and transaction execution, our ability to involve our German colleagues in support of this transaction was invaluable to our client's ability to ensure compliance with upstream regulatory obligations."
Barnett added: "This is the second indirect real estate deal we have closed in recent weeks. We expect to see more of these types of transactions as the foreign funds that have invested in Australian real estate come to the end of their terms."
Johannes van Reesema, Capital Transactions Manager at Real I.S., stated: "This was a landmark transaction for Real I.S. in Australia and we are very happy to successfully divest the asset, bringing a positive investment to its natural conclusion whilst achieving a strong outcome for our investors and clients. Sam, Kane and their respective teams at K&L Gates proved invaluable during the process providing commercial and practical advice. It was a pleasure working with them."
K&L Gates is a fully integrated global law firm with lawyers located across five continents. The firm represents leading multinational corporations, growth and middle-market companies, capital markets participants and entrepreneurs in every major industry group as well as public sector entities, educational institutions, philanthropic organizations and individuals.
