Amstar and Renaissance Sell Aura Shopping Center in Novosibirsk, Russia to RosEuro Development

MOSCOW, Aug. 12, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Amstar announced today the sale of Aura Shopping Center in Novosibirsk, the third largest city in Russia, to RosEuro Development.  Sources close to the transaction have identified the sale as the largest ever retail real estate transaction in Russia outside of Moscow and St. Petersburg.  However, specific terms of the transaction were not disclosed. 

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Aura Shopping Center was developed by Amstar in partnership with Renaissance Development and opened in 2011.  The center comprises more than 200 stores and 61,000 square meters (656,600 square feet) of leasable area over four floors.   Located within a five-minute walk of Lenin Square and the city's main street, Krasniy Prospect, Aura is the premier shopping center in Novosibirsk and is 100% leased.  The shopping center is anchored by Okey Hypermarket and MediaMarkt and includes a diverse mix of some of Russia's most popular retailers including Zara & other Inditex brands, Sportmaster, Adidas and New Yorker. Amstar continues to maintain a strong partnership with Renaissance with four shopping centers operational in Turkey, with a fifth to be opened in October.

"The sale of Aura marks the culmination of a successful project for Amstar and its investors and is an opportunity for RosEuro to add a stabilized, award-winning project to its growing portfolio of Russian regional malls," said Jason Lucas, President of Amstar Global Advisers.  In 2012, Aura was awarded the 2012 "Gold Brick" Award for Russia's "Best Regional Shopping Centre" by Commercial Real Estate Russia ("CRE") at the CRE Federal Awards.  The CRE "Gold Brick" Award is commonly viewed as the most prestigious award in Russian commercial real estate. Lucas added, "This sale demonstrates both the success of Amstar's global strategy and the strength of our long-standing partnership with Renaissance.  We remain confident in the Russian real estate market and will continue to seek out opportunities for commercial real estate development."

Aura will be the second operational shopping center in RosEuro's portfolio of Russian shopping centers.  Roseuro owns and operates the Planeta brand of shopping centers, with one open in Krasnoyarsk, a second soon to open in Ufa, and three further Planeta shopping centers under development in the Russian regions.

About Amstar

Established in 1987 and headquartered in Denver, Colorado, Amstar is a real estate investment manager that acquires, develops and manages office, multifamily, retail, hotel and industrial properties in select U.S. and international markets. Originally formed to invest and manage the real estate allocation of a large family office client, Amstar began expanding its capital strategy nearly a decade ago and has grown to more than $2.5 billion in assets under management (as of June 30, 2013). Amstar's clients originate from across the globe and include U.S. and European institutions, insurance companies, private banks, funds of funds, and family offices. For more information, visit www.amstar.com.

About Renaissance

Renaissance Development is the investment branch of Renaissance Engineering and Construction of Turkey, the world's third largest international retail contractor and 18^th largest general building contractor.  Renaissance has 288,000 m² (3.1 million sf) of commercial space including three regional shopping centers in Russia.  In addition, Renaissance has more than 2.8 million m² (30 million sf) of commercial space including 11 shopping centers in Turkey.  For more information, visit www.rendvlp.com.

About RosEuro Development

RosEuro Development was founded in 2004 and is a leading full-service development company which provides concept development, construction and asset management services to development projects throughout Russia.   Headquartered in Moscow, the Company has built and leased over 700,000 m² of various facilities.  For more information, visit www.red-realty.ru.

SOURCE Amstar