ECE has held the first closing for its second retail property fund called ECE European Prime Shopping Centre Fund II, with over €500m having been collected. The Otto family along with ECE employees are among the investors along various global institutional investors including “leading pension funds and sovereign wealth funds.” ECE says investors from Fund 1 have signed up for Fund II, as have new strategic partners. The goal is to collect €750m, which would equal a gross asset value of roughly €2bn. The fund will continue were ECE Fund 1 left off, targeting existing shopping centers across Europe that have value-add potential. The first to be placed in the fund will be ECE’s own Zielone Arkady shopping mall in Bydgoszcz, Poland, which is due to open in 2015. The fund’s investment period should last until 2018.
