OREANDA-NEWS. February 06, 2014. The EBRD has invested USD 50 million to acquire a minority equity stake in Amtel Properties Development Ltd (“Amtel”), a regional property group focused on building and operating commercial and residential real estate assets across Russia, Ukraine, Belarus and Georgia.

The EBRD’s investment will initially support the construction of a 16,000 sq. m. cold storage logistics centre near Tbilisi airport in Georgia and a 120-room three-star business hotel to be operated by Hilton under the Hampton brand in Minsk, Belarus as well as property developments in Russia and Ukraine.

The Tbilisi and Minsk developments will fill gaps in the logistics and hotel sectors which are under-developed in these markets.

The Bank’s investment is in line with its broader objective of making new equity capital available for real estate development companies which are focused on regional property markets.
The EBRD’s Special Shareholder Fund is financing an audit of the Amtel’s properties in order to identify improvements needed to raise performance levels by implementing energy savings and water efficiency initiatives.

One example of the impact of the energy efficiency measures relates to the Minsk hotel, whereby the project’s energy performance is expected to be over 20 percent better than the current local practise due to the installation of best available techniques.