A slew of new tenants — including the PharmaSwiss company, the Trilux group and Sixt Lease and Sixt Autopůjčovna firms — will be moving into the Lighthouse building in Prague’s Holešovice district. The PharmaSwiss company represents a number of foreign pharmaceutical companies in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE). Trilux is a global player in the field of lighting systems and architectural lighting. Sixth Lease provides operative leasing and full service leasing for an unlimited number of cars and makes. Sixt Autopůjčovna offers cars for hire online in 85 countries.

Cushman & Wakefield Prague had an excellent 2006. The company announced that its annual turnover increase 35 percent and its staffing level surged to 82 percent, up from 61 percent the previous year. Last year, the company also established a residential property section focused on the sale of large-scale residential projects, land sales and acquisitions and development consultancy.

The next steps of the ongoing refurbishment of the Imperial Hotel Ostrava, which recently won the Customer Satisfaction Award for the Moravian-Silesian Region 2006 by the Czech Consumers Association, are planned for the first quarter of this year, which will increase the hotel’s capacity from its current 155 rooms to 163 rooms. During this phase, an entire floor of standard rooms will be reconstructed and refurbished into luxury comfort rooms. All refurbishments are scheduled to be completed in spring 2008. The four-star hotel currently offers 155 fully equipped rooms.

Logistics provider FLS Praha, s.r.o. has signed a lease contract with Portland Trust to begin using the premises at Karlovarská Business Park in Prague. Karlovarská Business Park is located at the junction of Karlovarská and the western ring road, adjacent to the D5 highway, providing convenient transportation access. FLS, a provider of contract logistics, is undergoing rapid development, and company officials said they needed more warehouse space.

Orco Property Group acquired Stein Brewery. The company said it plans to sell and relocate the brewery and build a modern multipurpose complex on the plot, which will have residential premises, civil infrastructures and possibly a hotel.

DTZ released a report revealing that CEE has emerged as a “worldwide source” in the Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) sector, which began to take off in Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary during the late 1990s. BPO was driven in these regions primarily by the low cost of labor supplies, according to DTZ.

Currently Prague’s modern office stock stands at 1.9 million square meters (20.45 million square feet), according to the Prague Research Forum. In the fourth quarter of 2006, 75,000 square meters of modern office stock were completed, including BB Centrum Gamma, Smíchov Gate, The Park Building 10, Anděl City Building 11, U-Centre and phase two of Palác Křižík. The most significant deals of this quarter were Hochtief VSB in Smíchov Gate, Prague 5; Jobpilot CZ in Luxembourg Plaza, Prague 3; OMD in Pankrác House, Prague 4; and Český Rozhlas in the Allianz Building, Prague 2.

The MIPIM conference, which will be held in Cannes, France, in March, announced that the urban designer Daniel Libeskind will open the proceedings with a survey of global trends in architecture. Stelios, CEO of Easygroup and founder of easyJet, will discuss the benefits of his strategy for diversifying the low-cost concept, while Henri Giscard d’Estaing, CEO of Club Méditerranée, will demonstrate his approach to upgrading the brand’s target segment to boost profitability.

Orco Property Group announced it is studying a possible capital increase and listing of its ordinary shares on the Warsaw and Budapest stock exchanges. The company says it is currently considering a capital increase of approximately 100 million euros ($130 million/2.8 billion Kč). It expects to use the proceeds to finance the continuing expansion of its property portfolio in CEE. ORCO says it is targeting an offering during the second quarter of 2007.

The Endurance Residential subfund has made its first acquisition in Germany: a residential portfolio of five buildings in Hamburg. The properties were acquired for 10 million euros and include 105 residential units and 10 retail units. Further acquisitions in the Czech Republic and Germany are being planned. The Endurance Residential subfund is focused on the acquisition, development, management and disposition of middle-class and luxury residential properties across CEE and in Germany.

Almost half a million square meters of industrial properties cropped up in the Czech Republic last year, according to Cushman & Wakefield. This is double the area built in 2005, when 241,000 square meters of new industrial space was developed. “Last year was a record year, and not only in terms of new construction,” said Ferdinand Hlobil, head of the Central European industrial team at Cushman & Wakefield. “We also registered enormous demand.”

Quinlan Private Golub has appointed John Newton development director for Slovakia. Newton will head the team working on the iconic long-term creation of the new development at South City, Bratislava, a joint venture by Quinlan Private Golub and Cresco. Newton has previously worked for Marks & Spencer, Lend Lease and the Frontier Estates Group.

Paris leads this year’s list of top real estate investment markets in Europe, according to a report published by PricewaterhouseCoopers and the Urban Land Institute. The survey interviewed almost 400 of the industry’s leading authorities to identify Europe’s top cities for real estate investment. Survey respondents pointed to the city’s economic stability and sustainability, in addition to its status as a global gateway, as major reasons for its top ranking as an investment market.