Pinnacle

Rajesh Unnikrishnan, Mumbai
The Economic Times

In one of the largest office-space real estate transactions in India, Standard Chartered — India’s leading foreign bank — has acquired commercial space building Titantium in Mumbai-suburb Goregaon for about Rs 325 crore.

Standard Chartered, which bought the space from developer K Raheja, will get six floors and around 1,50,000 sq. ft. through this acquisition. The space will be used to house the back-office operations of its consumer banking division and other support staff.

Confirming the development, a Standard Chartered spokesperson said, “We are investing in growth. All our business are growing and this investment is to meet our increased staff requirement over the next 3-4 years.”

However, he was reluctant to divulge the financial details of the deal. Sources close to the deal said Standard Chartered is scouting for more properties in Delhi, Bangalore and even Mumbai, to meet its future plans.

The UK-based bank has doubled its post-tax profits in India from Rs 601 crore in March 2005 to Rs 1,364 crore in March 2007, increasing profits by 50.5% and 50.7%, respectively over the past two years. Its staff strength has jumped by 4,000 people over the past five quarters to over 17,000. The bank is expected to increase its India headcount to over 25,000 in the next three years, which will include around 15,000 non-BPO employees.

Recently, Standard Chartered recruited heavily for its consumer banking business, corporate banking and also in the global markets. It is also hiring for its soon-to-be-launched private banking operations, which is expected to be a big focus area for the bank. The deal with K Raheja comes at a time when the commercial real estate market is expected to enter a bearish phase due to oversupply.

Property consultancy firms believe oversupply in office space in most grade A cities in the past 6-12 months may result in a fall in rentals and capital values. However, they feel Mumbai market will be an exception because of the huge demand-supply mismatch.

According to a recent report by real estate consultancy firm DTZ, markets like the National Capital Region of Delhi, Bangalore, Chennai, Pune, Kolkata and Hyderabad, except Mumbai, will face oversupply in the range of 20-200% of the estimated demand in 2007. Mumbai, however, will continue to have supply shortage for some more time.