AXA Real Estate Investment Managers acquired Bodio Center business park in Milan from Aberdeen Asset Management

Paris, 5-6-2013 — /europawire.eu/ — AXA Real Estate Investment Managers (“AXA Real Estate”), the leading real estate portfolio and asset manager in Europe¹, with €45 billion of assets under management as at March 2013, announces that it has acquired on behalf of a client, two prime office buildings, totalling 24,000 sqm, as well as two retail buildings, totalling 4,000 sqm, at the Bodio Center business park, in Milan, from Aberdeen Asset Management for €63.9 million. The transaction represents AXA Real Estate’s largest acquisition in Italy since 2010.

The buildings acquired include the Bodio 4 and Bodio 5 office schemes, as well as the Le Vela and La Stilo retail buildings. The office buildings are fully let to high quality tenants across several industry sectors and act as the Italian headquarters of a major global pharmaceutical company. In addition, an agreement has been reached with an important Italian retail banking chain, to occupy 10,000 sqm at Bodio 4 as its corporate headquarters. The retail buildings are also fully let to two restaurant operators and a gym, providing useful amenities for the complex’s office workers.

The Bodio Center was completed in 2004 and is located in the city’s north-west quadrant. It comprises 65,000 sqm of office-led space and is situated within an established business location in Milan, which is home to several high-profile domestic and multinational corporations.

Alessio Lucentini, Head of Italian Asset Management & Transactions at AXA Real Estate, said: “This acquisition shows AXA Real Estate’s strong local investment management and execution skills, as well as our ability to attract non domestic capital on relatively large transactions in Italy; this being one of the first by a non-Italian investor since the economic crisis began.”

Riccardo Dallolio, European Head of Transactions at AXA Real Estate, said: “The acquisition at the Bodio Center has allowed us to purchase two high quality office buildings in one of Milan’s major business districts, let to quality tenants with strong covenants, at an opportune time in the market cycle. This transaction shows that we are active within value add opportunities at attractive pricing on behalf of our clients.”

1. Source: INREV Survey 2011 published in July 2012.

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AXA Real Estate Investment Managers (AXA Real Estate), a wholly-owned subsidiary of AXA Investment Managers, is the largest real estate portfolio and asset manager in Europe, with over €45 billion of assets under management as at the end of March 2013. It has over 140 third party institutional clients spread across the world, in addition to managing funds for 10 AXA insurance companies.

With over 500 real estate professionals operating in 22 countries, AXA Real Estate’s competitive advantage stems from its global fund management expertise combined with extensive on-the-ground deal sourcing, asset management and development execution capabilities.

AXA Real Estate structures and actively manages or advises investment products, seeking wide ranging opportunities along the risk spectrum to deliver targeted returns commensurate with clients’ risk profiles, through a variety of investment strategies. These range from core to opportunistic, country-specific to geographically-diversified, sector-specific to multi-sector, with the capacity to invest at all levels of the capital structure.

Global growth remains a key priority and AXA Real Estate is currently expanding its presence in both the US and Asia. Assets under management have grown from €17 billion 12 years ago to €45 billion today.

Visit our website: www.axa-realestate.com

AXA Investment Managers (AXA IM) is a multi-expert asset management company within the AXA Group, a global leader in financial protection and wealth management. AXA IM is one of the largest European-based asset managers with approximately €562 billion in assets under management as of the
end of March 2013. AXA IM employs 2,400 people around the world and operates out of 23 countries.

Visit our internet website: www.axa-im.com

Press Contacts
AXA Real Estate
Jocelyne Tamssom
Tel: +33 1 44 45 97 95
jocelyne.tamssom@axa-im.com

FTI Consulting Inc.
Richard Sunderland, Stephanie Highett, Daniel O’Donnell
Tel: +44 20 7831 3113
AXARealEstate@fticonsulting.com