China's Junfa to join up with Charn Issara
CHINA-BASED Junfa Real Estate Co Ltd has made its first investment in Thailand by setting up a joint-venture company with Thai firm Charn Issara Plc to develop a Bt3 billion mixed-use project in Phang Nga this year.
Junfa holds a 30-per-cent stake in the joint-venture firm and the rest is owned by Charn Issara, with registered capital of Bt420 million.
“We invested in Thailand when we saw the business potential to expand in Asean,” Junfa chairman Li Man Bun said.
This is the first Junfa project in an Asean country, and is part of a plan to invest more in the region when the Asean Economic Community comes into full effect in December.
Junfa was ranked a top-100 excellence enterprise in China’s real estate sector from 2010-12. The company has focused on developing projects in Yunnan, Sichuan, Guizhou, and Hainan. It reported sales of 10 billion yuan (Bt52.2 billion) in 2012.
Charn Issara chief executive and managing director Songkran Issara said that having a strategic partner in China meant there was the potential to expand Charn Issara in China.
He said the company had revised its business from developing residential and hospitality projects to now also being engaged in hospitality management in Thailand and overseas.
“We are negotiating with Junfa Real Estate Co Ltd to manage Junfa Real Estate Co Ltd’s hospitality businesses in China, and there may be two or three in the next two or three years,” he said.
He added that the company would sign a management contract to run a hotel in Patong in the second half of the year. Over the next few years, the company plans to manage up to five hotels in Thailand and overseas.
Charn Issara also has the opportunity to develop residential projects in China through Junta, Songkran said.
Since 2012, Charn Issara has set up four joint-venture firms to develop residential and hospitality projects.
They include Issara United Co Ltd, a joint venture with Saha Group, CIN Estate Co Ltd, a joint venture firm with Nawarat Pattanakarn Plc, and Charn Issara Vipapol Co, a joint venture firm with Vipapol Group. Songkran said the company had set aside an investment budget of between Bt500 million and Bt600 million this year to develop two condominium projects with Issara United and CIN Estate. It would also spend Bt900 million to develop a new villa at Sri Panwa, Phuket.
