VSIP II Industrial Park in the southern province of Binh Duong.
Photo courtesy of Becamex.

Logistics and industrial park giants carried out many mergers and acquisitions (M&A) in the first half of this year, despite the Covid-19 outbreaks, according to Savills Vietnam.

The real estate consultancy reports that Boustead Projects (Vietnam) Company reached a deal to buy a 49 percent stake in KTG & Boustead Industrial Logistics Joint Stock Company. The deal involves 13 real estate projecs totaling $141 million, including some 840,000 square meters of land and around 550,000 square meters of leasable land.

The ESR Cayman Limited and BW Industrial Development Joint Stock Company joined hands to develop a 240,000-square meter industrial land area in My Phuoc 4 Industrial Park in the southern province of Binh Duong.

The KCN Vietnam Group Joint Stock Company spent $300 million buying back a 250-ha land area. It plans to develop high-end warehouses and ready-built factories in cities and provinces across Vietnam, including Bac Giang, Hai Phong, Hai Duong, Dong Nai and Long An.

John Campbell, manager of industrial services at Savills Vietnam, said along with the M&A, there was significant foreign direct investment (FDI) in production and in industrial parks in Vietnam =n the first half of this year. Most of the fresh FDI in production, $1.97 billion, was poured into the northern region.

However, David Jackson, general director at Colliers Vietnam, another real estate firm, predicted that Vietnam would face some challenges in the second half of this year because of the latest Covid-19 outbreak. He also said that there are still some FDI bottlenecks in industrial real estate, including unsynchronous infrastructure, uncompetitive logistics costs, and inadequate mechanisms and legal regulations.