Cushman & Wakefield’s Japan-based asset management arm has acquired a development site for a warehouse in the northern reaches of Greater Tokyo, marking the latest addition to the firm’s pipeline of six planned logistics projects in Asia’s second-largest economy.

The facility in Saitama prefecture’s Kazo City will comprise a gross floor area of 27,000 square metres (290,626 square feet) and is scheduled for completion in May 2024, Cushman & Wakefield said in a release. The firm didn’t disclose the deal value or the identity of the seller.

Situated 5.1 kilometres (3.2 miles) from the Hanyu Interchange and 5.8 kilometres from the Kazo Interchange on the Tohoku Expressway, the Kazo site will host Cushman’s second logistics facility in Saitama prefecture, following a previous project in the city of Kuki.

“Kazo City has a good agglomeration of logistics bases and our planned two-storey facility will enhance the area’s capacity to meet the prefecture’s diverse and growing logistics needs,” said Yoshiyuki Tanaka, who leads the capital markets division of Cushman & Wakefield in Japan. “We will continue to contribute to regional revitalisation and industrial development by supplying highly functional properties.”

Distribution Hub

Dubbed LF Kazo as part of Cushman’s logistics facility series, the new project is about 60 kilometres north of central Tokyo and close to Kazo Otone Industrial Park, which houses many factories and distribution centres.

LF Kazo can be leased as a single-tenant building or divided into two tenant spaces, according to Cushman & Wakefield. The facility aims to achieve a CASBEE certification of A (very good) as part of the firm’s sustainability commitment.

In addition to LF Kazo, Cushman’s development pipeline includes three projects in Ibaraki prefecture northeast of Saitama and two in Nara prefecture south of Kyoto, spanning 451,000 square metres of gross floor area in total.

The largest of the six, LF Nara in the prefecture’s Ikoma district, will provide 124,000 square metres of GFA upon its scheduled completion in March of this year.

Shed-Making Competitors

Cushman’s announcement comes after a rival fund manager, M&G Real Estate, formed a partnership last August with industrial giant ESR to develop a portfolio of logistics properties in Japan.

UK-based M&G plans to deploy up to $350 million in equity towards the development vehicle with a focus on the cities of Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya — the latter of which is hosting the inaugural project, Nagoya Minami 2 Distribution Centre. M&G previously invested in two ESR logistics centres in Ichikawa and Nagoya.

In 2021, ESR’s Japan-focused development venture with Dutch pension fund manager APG expanded by JPY 75 billion ($675 million), bringing its total investment capacity to JPY 470 billion.

The ESR-APG vehicle, known as Japan Logistics Fund III, has committed at least JPY 65 billion to five projects with a total GFA of 870,000 square metres.