In an interview with PropertyEU, Christof Prange, head of Germany at industrial specialist Goodman, provides an overview of the company’s activities in this fast expanding market and discusses the opportunities that lie ahead. He also explains how Goodman is leveraging its expertise gained in other markets and replicating this in Germany.

Can you tell us about Goodman?
Goodman is a global industrial property specialist and funds management group. We own, develop and manage high-quality, modern and sustainable real estate in strategic locations around the world. In Continental Europe (CE), our portfolio spans Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, France, Italy and Spain.

What is Goodman’s strategy?
Today, the press of a button can set a whole industry in motion. This includes the storage and movement of data and goods globally, where orders are picked, packed and dispatched to meet ever shrinking delivery windows. What used to take days, now takes hours, even minutes. Goodman helps make that happen. Our global strategy is focused on providing essential infrastructure for the digital economy through high-quality, sustainable properties close to consumers.

How is this unfolding in the German market?
4.5 billion. That’s the number of courier, express and parcel deliveries that took place in Germany in the past year. This rapidly expanding market is driving fierce demand for high-quality, sustainable space in strategic locations. Goodman’s portfolio in Germany exceeds two million square metres across more than 60 properties. Customers predominantly operate across the e-commerce, retail, manufacturing transport and logistics sectors such as Amazon, DB Schenker, DHL, DSV, Kuehne + Nagel and Zalando.

We are increasing our investments in strategic, urban infill locations with high population density and strong connectivity including Dusseldorf, Hamburg, Frankfurt, Cologne and Munich, bringing industrial property to where it is needed most.

Home to the second-largest container port and largest rail port in Europe, Hamburg is strategically important for serving European inland markets. The Port of Hamburg has a consumer reach of 450 million and saw 128.7 million tons of seaborne cargo throughput in 2021. We have seven developments in the heart of the region, including Hamburg South Light Industrial Park in Seevetal. We’re bringing forward the second phase of this strategic and flexible development, offering customers the opportunity to combine office space, production and warehousing facilities under one roof.

We are also building our second Light Industrial Park in Wedel on the Hamburg city boundary, while growing our presence in GVZ Bremen and progressing additional sites at the Port of Duisburg, the world’s largest inland port and one of Europe’s most vital logistics locations.

What are the opportunities in the German market?
Outside of traditional logistics and distribution space, we are diversifying our product to meet demand from growing markets, such as data centres in the Frankfurt area.

To date we have developed over 495,000 m2 of data centre space globally and procured 609MW of dedicated power across multiple regional platforms for a range of customers. Replicating this in Europe, we’re working with colleagues overseas to apply their experience, such as in Tokyo and Hong Kong, where we have several data centre developments.

At Goodman Business Park in Chiba, we are developing two data centres within our master planned estate. They will comprise 60,000 square metres of gross floor area, resulting in a development potential of 60 MW IT across the two buildings.

From standard logistics, last mile and distribution facilities to data centres, we aim to support customers and meet their needs as sustainably as possible. We’re also exploring multi-storey developments in Europe, including Germany, offering a sophisticated solution to land scarcity challenges.

What’s next for the industrial and logistics market and Goodman in Germany?
The storage and movement of data and goods globally of course has an impact on the environment, while customers are also dealing with rising inflation and macroeconomic challenges. So, a key focus for us in Germany is sustainability, helping customers be more productive and sustainable in their supply chains to by providing strategic locations that reduce the distance of the lastmile, delivery times and costs.

We are also optimising space and leveraging technology to increase efficiency of our buildings. Fit for the future, our properties feature a range of sustainability features such as modern air source heat pump technology, while we have committed to installing 400MW of solar photovoltaic (PV) panels globally by 2025 - we are already over the halfway mark at 203MW.

Our 2030 sustainability strategy encompasses three pillars – sustainable properties, people and culture and corporate performance. It articulates our shared global vision toward delivering positive change, with clear targets to hold us accountable. In-line with the ‘sustainable properties’ element, Greenspace+ is Goodman Continental Europe’s own regional roadmap towards building and operating net-positive spaces.