One of the youngest businesses within the Shapoorji and Pallonji Group, Shapoorji Pallonji Real Estate (SP Real Estate) has been in existence for 25 years. The company started off in the early 1990s under the umbrella of SP Info City, which leased out large-scale commercial projects to IT and ITES companies in Chennai, Pune, Manesar and Mohali. Between 2010 and 2017, it successfully exited all these parks by selling them to various pension funds like CPPIB and Allianz. It also ventured into redevelopment within the city of Mumbai, after which it started acquiring land parcels across India – in Bengaluru, Kolkata and Pune. The real traction for the company started in the late 2000s, when it started developing on these land parcels. Going forward, SP Real Estate’s growth trajectory will be defined by projects in the ticket size of `4-10 million across key Indian cities, believes Venkatesh Gopalakrishnan, CEO, SP Real Estate, as he shares more about the company’s plans and prospects.

Tell us more about the brand SP Real Estate.
For the past 10 years, we have actually changed gears on the real-estate franchise. Today, we sell apartments worth about `35,000-40,000 million every year. We have a huge pipeline of about 120 million sq ft. So, what we are doing right now is just a fraction of what we will do in the next 20 years. We are a fully backwards-integrated developer with a presence across the value chain of real estate. Under the Shapoorji Pallonji brand, we plan to monetise on the land bank we have procured in the next 15-20 years.

What led to the inception of Joyville Shapoorji?
In 2016, while we were still developing the Sukhobrishti project under the segment of affordable homes in Kolkata, we had undertaken a JV company called Joyville Shapoorji to build homes for the middle class. To cater to this new market, we formed a JV platform with ADB, IFC and Actis and raised $200 million in equity. The funds have been invested successfully in eight projects across India, in Pune, Mumbai, Gurugram and Kolkata.

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