KSP seeks €300m in equity in wake of launch

A joint venture between the private investment vehicle of Poland’s richest man and New York’s Silverstein Properties has launched KSP Real Estate Investment Management, led by two former Heitman professionals.

Kulczyk Silverstein Properties (KSP), a Central and Eastern European real estate joint venture between private Polish firm Kulczyk Investments and New York developer Silverstein Properties, has launched a new private equity real estate business that is seeking up to €300 million in equity.

News of the firm follows PERE’s revelation last month that two former Heitman professionals, Otis Spencer and Dennis Dart, had left the Chicago-based company to establish the new platform, called KSP Real Estate Investment Management (KSP REIM).

In a statement, Warsaw-based KSP, which was set up in 2010, said KSP REIM intended to raise between €200 million and €300 million inequity for investments in the “highest class properties” in the CEE region, as well as in projects where value could be added via regeneration, renewal or repositioning. It said the strategy was to assemble enough equity to buy up to €500 million in assets and that the exit plan would be to list assets of a holding company on an international stock exchange.

Spencer and Dart both worked at Heitman in Europe until a few months ago. Spencer was managing director and co-head of Europe. Since 2005, he directed portfolio management for Heitman’s European private equity group and was portfolio manager for Heitman European Property Partners III and IV, the firm’s third and fourth in a series of European value-added real estate funds. Prior to joining Heitman, he worked at ABP Investments in the Netherlands, where he was a senior portfolio manager responsible for sourcing, structuring and managing non-listed real estate investments on behalf of ABP’s European and Asia-Pacific Strategic Funds.

Dart was executive vice president of Heitman European Private Equity and played a part in €3.5 billion of deals, as well as joint ventures and loan restructurings on behalf of the firm.

The new platform essentially is backed by Kulczyk Investments, the private investment firm of Jan Kulczyk, who is reputed to be the richest man in Poland with a net worth of around $2.7 billion, according to Forbes magazine, and Larry Silverstein’s development company, which is branching out internationally.