SNC-Lavalin Homburg Property Management, a company owned by two Canadian capital holding companies, has opened an office in Tallinn. Similar ventures are also being opened in Riga and Vilnius.
The company was founded by one of the biggest engineering, construction management and maintenance companies in the world, SNC-Lavalin Group Inc., with more than 100 years’ worth of experience together with the Baltic management and maintenance company Homburg Valda, which belongs to the Homburg group of companies. SNC-Lavalin Group has been developing and operating in the real estate field in Canada, the USA and the Netherlands for more than 40 years already.
According to SNC-Lavalin Homburg Property Management director Algirdas Augustaitis, incentives for the establishment of the joint venture included the existing work experience enjoyed by Homburg Group in the Baltic States, along with market development potential, especially in the field of public-private partnerships.
“Shortage of capital at the creation or improvment of infrastructures are problems not only in developing countries and not only in economically tight times. Public-private partnerships are very common in Canada, and bringing our long-term experience to Estonia should only be beneficial in the long term” said company director Algirdas Augustaitis.
In Algirdas’ opnion, SNC-Lavalin’s team was able to attract the largest possible level of capital even as the market is trying to overcome the most difficult circumstances as it is. For instance in 2010 the McGill group of university health centre clinics was backed with a 732 million US Dollar (approximately 573.6 million Euros at the time of writing) investment, which is currently the largest sum in the history of public-private partnerships in Canada.
With public and private partnerships undertaken in the performance of specific infrastructure projects such as railways, airports, bridges, hospitals and prisons, the parent company is planning to consolidate firms’ human resources.
In terms of offering its services to business enterprises operating in Estonia, SNC-Lavalin Homburg Property Management focuses its activities mainly towards retail, office and logistics centres. The new company’s director stated that the main competitive advantage it offers is a better relationship between price and quality than potential customers are currently offered in the market.
The company opened its Tallinn office on January 17th. The original article (in Estonian) can be viewed here.
Andrew Whyte
Tallinn Property by Goodson & Red
