Baker McKenzie has advised CASINO, a long-standing player in the French retail market and one of the global leaders in food trade, in the creation of the joint venture CD SUPPLY INNOVATION by CASINO and DIA.

This new entity will gather the two partners’ retail brand expertise as well as their experience in logistics and supply management. It will be in charge of purchasing retail brand and low-price goods for the two groups, however only for a part of their suppliers and while preserving their commercial and operational independence.

DLA Piper has advised the property fund manager, Savills Investment Management, on the establishment of its new fund Nordic Fund III – Retail, and the fund's subsequent acquisition of four retail parks in Haparanda, Borlänge, Uppsala and Uddevalla in Sweden from IKEA Centres.

DLA Piper advised on the Swedish, German and English law in relation to the acquisition of the retail parks, as well as the financing of the acquisition.

Willkie represents Apex, a Genstar portfolio company, on this acquisition, which will add $50 billion in assets under administration and custody for the fund administrator.

On January 8, Apex Group Ltd., Genstar Capital and SALU Capital announced Apex's acquisition of Warburg’s Asset Management and Servicing business in Luxembourg. Upon completion of the transaction, Apex, a Genstar portfolio company, will have nearly $350 billion of AuA. Apex and Genstar partnered with SALU Capital on this transaction.

DLA Piper has advised Catella Real Estate AG on its acquisition of an office property in Stuttgart for the special fund IWS II, from German Property AS, based in Oslo, Norway. The building in Stuttgart-Feuerbach has office space of approximately 10,600 square metres, and its main tenant is Robert Bosch GmbH.

The second Catella special fund, focussing solely on Southern Germany, manages four properties. Investors in the fund include pension funds, pension-scheme companies and savings banks, and the target equity ratio is 150 million euros.

Watson Farley & Williams (“WFW“) advised Blue Elephant Energy AG (“BEE”) on its acquisition of a 20 MW wind farm in Italy. The seller is a company in the European Energy Group, the buyer BEEGO IPP GmbH, an affiliate of BEE. The wind farm, located in the province of Potenza in the Basilicata region of southern Italy, comprises ten Vestas V110-2MW type wind turbines with a total capacity of 20 MW and has been operational since early 2017.

Jones Day acted for iQ Student Accommodation in relation to its acquisition of the UK focused Pure Student Living student housing property portfolio and business from LetterOne Treasury.

Linklaters has advised Chariot Top Group, a company represented by Griffin Real Estate, on a real estate portfolio acquisition comprising 28 shopping centres located across Poland from A-R-A Retail Centres, owned by a consortium formed by Ares Management L.P., AXA Investment Managers - Real Assets and Apollo Rida, and on the subsequent resale of 12 properties from this portfolio to Echo Polska Properties. This transaction has been widely acknowledged to be one of the largest real estate deals signed in 2017 in the CEE region (closing took place on 4 January 2018).

Real estate OPCI and SCPI investment funds managed by Amundi Immobilier and Primonial Real Estate Investment Management set up a joint venture for the off-plan acquisition of the "Tour Hekla" project, developed jointly by groups Hines and AG Real.

Hekla will be a new iconic 48-floor and 76,000 m²-tower, designed by French architect Jean Nouvel. Works will begin in 2018 in the heart of Paris-La Défense, Paris' business district.

The real estate team at Gide Warsaw law firm advised Yareal Polska on the purchase of post-industrial real property with a total area of 5.3 ha located on the area of SOHO Factory in the district of Praga-Poludnie in Warsaw.

There are plans to build a residential complex with a usable area of ca. 70 thousand square metres on the purchased real property, located between ul. Minska and ul. Zupnicza. The investment will retain the post-industrial look of the location, adding modern architectural and urban solutions.

Global law firm Norton Rose Fulbright has advised Tages Capital SGR, on the acquisition of 35 photovoltaic plants from Maccaferri Group and other shareholders. The acquisition comprised the entire corporate capital of Finsolar S.r.l., Sicilia Solare S.r.l., FTV Apea S.r.l., Pietrafitta FV S.r.l. and Società Agricola Sintonage a r.l. (the “SPVs”).

The SPVs own a portfolio of 25 ground-mounted photovoltaic plants and ten photovoltaic greenhouses with an overall capacity of 51.2 MWp, which is one of the largest in Italy.