This article is from the Australian Property Journal archive
STOCKLAND has secured Fung Lam’s e-commerce company New Aim for the first completed building at its $2 billion master-planned Melbourne Business Park.
New Aim was established by Lam and Werner Liu as an eBay store in 2003, and Fung bought out his business partner for $101 million two years ago. The company is now expanding to a 31,500 sqm state-of-the-art warehouse at 90 Melbourne Drive in Melbourne’s western suburb of Truganina.
New Aim says it has delivered consumer brands and products from online marketplaces to more than 60% of Australian households since it was founded.
“The move to Melbourne Business Park is an exciting evolution of our company which started as an eBay store in 2003 and is now among the fastest-growing private e-commerce companies in the Asia-Pacific,” co-founder and CEO Fung said.
“From this new, modern facility, our team will operate our business-to-many model partnering with more than 40 Australian online marketplaces and omnichannel retailers to dispatch goods to business customers and direct consumers across Australia.”
The deal builds on Stockland and New Aim’s partnership that goes back to 2016 with a 5,000 sqm shed at the Brooklyn Distribution Centre, and which has increased since to 65,000 sqm.
Stockland’s executive general manager for logistics, Tony D’Addona said Melbourne Business Park is well connected to the western arterial road networks.
“We’ve seen many businesses attracted to the precinct’s strategic location in Melbourne’s west with easy connections to the western arterial road networks, including the Western Freeway, the Western Ring Road, and the future Outer Metropolitan Ring Road, as well as Melbourne Airport, the Port of Melbourne, and Melbourne’s CBD.
“Stockland has a $6.4 billion development pipeline of modern, flexible and future-proofed facilities that are essential infrastructure to drive our cities’ economies, local employment opportunities and business success.”
The New Aim facility is targeting a 5 Star Green Star rating through rooftop photovoltaic solar systems, water and energy metering systems to monitor building performance, energy-efficient LED lighting, sustainably-sourced timber products used in the building process and rainwater collection for irrigation.
Stockland and joint venture partner Mt Atkinson Holdings launched the 95-hectare first stage of 260-hectare Melbourne Business Park in 2019. It is expected to deliver about one million square metres of warehouse space.
The initial stage of Melbourne Business Park comprises 23 industrial lots, 10 hectares of wetlands and two parks for workers and residents of Stockland’s neighbouring Mt. Atkinson community.
In the middle of this year it was reported that Stockland was seeking a capital partner for more than $2 billion worth of warehouse and logistics facilities, which include the second stage of Melbourne Business Park and the Brooklyn Distribution Centre.
Seed assets include Sydney’s Ingleburn Logistics Park, Leppington Business Park, and a redevelopment in Banksmeadow, another western Melbourne asset in the Altona Industrial Estate, and the Willawong Distribution Centre in Brisbane.
