Kinh Bac in search of foreign partners

The Vietnamese company is looking for overseas investors to help fund its real estate developments
Photo: Le Toan

In its shareholders’ meeting held recently in the northern province of Bac Ninh, Kinh Bac City Development Holding Corporation chairman Dang Thanh Tam said that foreign funds from Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Thailand, and Finland had advised the company to find more foreign partners to co-invest in its current projects.

All these funds are operating mostly in Asian countries and are keenly interested in Vietnam’s market.

“By inviting foreign partners to co-invest in our project, Kinh Bac could balance both short- and long-term benefits,” Tam said, adding that apart from the traditional business of industrial leasing, Kinh Bac still had a large fund of residential land and this could be used to entice more foreign investors with a wealth of financial management experience.

Kinh Bac now owns 600 hectares of cleared land in the northern port city of Haiphong. Tam plans to either transfer part of this land to other investors, or develop housing projects here.

“2016 is the right time for housing development, so Kinh Bac will reserve a fund of land for this purpose,” he said.

Kinh Bac has a total of 4,500ha earmarked for industrial zoning, and another 1,300ha for residential development nationwide. With more than ten years of experience in the real estate market, Kinh Bac’s portfolio features a wide range of development projects, including industrial zones in Que Vo in Bac Ninh, Trang Cat and Trang Due in Haiphong, Quang Chau in the northern province of Bac Giang, and residential areas in Phuc Ninh and Quang Chau in Bac Giang.

Kinh Bac is also the owner of a 6-star hotel, office, and trading centre complex in Hanoi’s My Dinh area. Five years ago, Kinh Bac assumed control of the Diamond Rice Flower complex from a Japanese investor who could not implement it. Although the company has plans to invest $1 billion into this project, so far the site remains a vacant plot littered with broken glass. As of April 2016, Kinh Bac had disbursed VND119 billion ($5.6 million) in the development of this project. However, this has remained frozen for the last four years.