ULI Shanghai Winter Meeting was successfully held on 8-9 December at Shanghai Andaz Xintiandi. Over 300 guests convened on site and more of the guests participated virtually in the event. More than 40 real estate senior leaders from developers, investment institutions, architectural design institutions, consultants and law firms were invited to deliver speeches to share their insights into the trend of real estate market as well as what could be done to navigate a way through the depression. As one of the most important events ULI China Mainland holds every year, ULI Shanghai Winter Meeting covered timely and important topics for the real estate industry and provide many opportunities for networking with other ULI members and guests.

After a relaxed breakfast, Mr. Ken Rhee, the event moderator and Senior Director of ULI China Mainland welcomed the guests and announced the opening of 2022 ULI Shanghai Winter Meeting, where Mr. Stuart Mercier, ULI China Mainland Chair, Managing Partner and Head of Asia (Real Estate), Brookfield Asset Management, expressed his appreciation to everyone for their participation and conveyed his expectations for the conference via VCR.

As the keynote speaker, Mr. Puah Tze Shyang, CEO of CapitaLand Investment (China), introduced CapitaLand and shared with the audience the direction of future business development.

Mr. Hei Ming Cheng, Founder and Chairman of KaiLong Group and ULI Asia Pacific Vice Chair, had an in-depth discussion with Mr. Puah on the future trends and opportunities in China real estate market.

In the Investor Panel, Mr. Hank Hsu, Co-founder and CEO of Forest Logistics Properties, Mr. Keaton Yu, Senior Vice President of Capital and Fund Management of DNE, Mr. John Zheng, Managing Director of Equity Capital Markets of Tishman Speyer, and Mr. Albert Wu, Managing Director of Hopson Real Estate, together with the hosting guest Ken Zheng, General Manager of Shanghai Huafa Commercial, discussed the investment strategies and portfolios of their respective funds and relevant adjustments and changes. Then they carried on the forecast to the future market prospect.

Mr. David Green-Morgan, Global Head of Real Assets Research, MSCI, presented the role of China in Asia’s investment market and the major trends he had observed in the global market.

Mr. Anderson Hsieh, AECOM Vice President, Vice Chairman of the AIA Shanghai and the hosting guest of the theme of “How Sustainable and Resilient are our Cities?” led the discussion with the guests including Mr. Albert Chan, Director of Development Planning and Design and Chief Sustainability Officer of Shui On Land, Ms. Dou Zhang, Director of  Shanghai office, Sasaki, Ms. Ellen Lou, Principal of SOM San Francisco, and Mr. Stanley Yip, Adjunct Professor of Energy Research Instituter, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.

Ms. Jenny Zhang, ESG and Decarbonisation Director for ULI Asia Pacific, and Mr. Dong Xiao, Executive Director, Beijing, ULI China Mainland, shared the findings of ULI NZI Report. NZI (Net Zero Initiative) is launched by ULI in the Greater Bay Area and Beijing.

Mr. Ethan Yao, Managing Director of Design Management East China, China Resources Land, Mr. Wei Li, Associate Partner and Architecture Design Director of Kokaistudios and Ms. Emily Phang, Senior Partner of Foster + Partners introduced the recently opened and highly focused Suhe Centre MT and Mixc World in Shanghai, from different perspectives such as master planning, commercial design and office building design.

Mr. William Gu, Vice President of Tencent Cloud and General Manager of Architectural and Real Estate Industry, Mr. Anson Chan, Managing Director of Relifestyling, Mr. Todd Pilgreen, Managing Director of Gensler, Mr. Florian Pucher, Principal of Hassell and the hosting guest Tammy Tang, Managing Director of China Colliers discussed how to rethink mixed use projects and the challenges they were currently facing with.

Mr. Hans Kang, Managing Director and CEO of Healthcare Infrastructure, CBC Group, Mr. Peng Yang, CEO of Azure Capital and Mr. Khoon Ng, President of Paladin Capital Management, discussed the new trends and opportunities on the horizon with the hosting guest Ms. Carolyn Qian, Senior Associate of King & Wood Mallesons, as well as the investment opportunities and operational insights observed in sectors such as the distressed asset, condominium and hotel, and healthcare property.

Mr. Vic Zhou, CEO of Vlinker Services Co., Ltd., Ms. Joanna Low, COO of Perennial, Mr. Francis Jiang, Finance Director of Greystar and the hosting guest Sherril Sheng, Research Director of JLL China Residential Sector shared the business models of long-term rental apartments and senior living properties, as well as the new trends and changes in the customer structure and demand in recent years.

A one-on-one interview was carried out during the Fireside Chat between Ms. Jessica Yu, Chairwoman of Golden Union Group, and the hosting guest Carrie Liu, General Manager of China Life Real Estate Asset Management Company Limited. Ms. Yu shared her experience in urban renewal sector.

At the end of the day, Ms. Shirley Shao, Executive Director of ULI Shanghai gave a closing remark and invited Ms. Lina Wong, Founder and CEO of dZPACE and Co-Chair of Women Leadership Initiative, ULI China Mainland, to introduce ULI’s achievements in the field of philanthropy and call for more help to the socially underprivileged.

An ESG Summit was launched on the second day. Ms. Wen Wang, Assistant Vice President and Head of Design and Project Management of Kailong Group, gave a welcome remark.

During the ESG Head Panel, Mr. Jiajun Zhang, MEP Senior Manager, Hongkong Land (China), Ms. Carmen Ng, Deputy General Manager Sustainability of Hang Lung Properties, Ms.Wen Wang, Assistant Vice President and Head of Design and Project Management of Kailong Group, Ms. Vickie Chen, General Manager of Sustainable Development, Shui On Land, Ms. Rachel Tao, Senior Vice President of GLP and General Manager of HAIYI DESIGN, and the hosting guest Mr. Marco Meng, Head of Property & Asset Management Services, Senior Director of Savills China, and Chairman of Savills China Sustainability Council, introduced their companies, their ESG plans and goals, as well as the potential solutions on how to address the challenges.

In this event, ULI invited many real estate related companies to share real ESG cases on content ranging from the design for resilience and sustainability in response to COVID-19 epidemic and natural disaster; low or zero carbon building material and embodied carbon calculation; smart building operation, to renewable energy.

The diverse ESG related content made the morning fulfilling and impressive. Finally, Ms. Viki Du, Senior Manager of Sustainability, Hang Lung Properties, gave the closing remark. She mentioned that corporate level control, project development and execution at the management level are crucial to the implementation of ESG. She also shared briefly the experiences of Hang Lung Properties over the past year since joining ULI Greenprint Center for Building Performance, and called on industry colleagues to take action and make contributions as much as they can for carbon reduction and sustainable development.

Thus, the 2022 ULI Shanghai Winter Meeting came to a satisfactory close. We sincerely thank the sponsors of this event and the annual sponsors of Eastern China for their support. ULI is committed to promoting its mission of shaping the future of the built environment for transformative impact in communities worldwide. And we will continue our efforts to provide more communication platforms and industry insights for real estate professionals. Please look forward to 2023 ULI Shanghai Summer Meeting!