Bridge5Asia: Streamlining Real Estate Asset Management in China

The Chinese economy, since the early 2000s, has been through a long-drawn period of structural transformation. Among many other changes, this transformation has its effects on the burgeoning real estate sector as well—most noticeably, its tighter integration with the capital markets. This is exemplified by the fact that, almost all commercial builders today invariably look up to capital markets to fund their projects. This newfound access to capital, however, comes with its obligations: developers must adhere to the best practices in asset management and strive to increase their operational efficiency. No wonder, with this shift, real-estate companies across the board are fervently looking out for asset management expertise to deliver exceptional returns to their valued investors. Singapore based real estate consultancy firm, Bridge5Asia, is one of the main players catering to this growing demand from commercial real estate space across Chinese market. The company provides integrated asset management solutions which include consultancy services, software systems, and market research reports. Allan Wu in 2012 founded Bridge5Asia. A Certified Public Accountant (CPA) and a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA), Allan has extensive asset management experience across Singapore, Chinese, and Indian markets.

Over the years, under his leadership, the company has delivered consultancy services and has constantly been upgrading to newer trends in asset management best practices. Keeping up with their methodology that is ‘Asset Light Strategy’, the company helps clients lower their operating costs and associated risks and delivers Asset light based business development strategies.

Additionally, the company’s asset management software platform AMSS helps clients improve efficiency and facilitates faster decision making while managing real estate assets. The ease of use makes the software accessible to everyone, thus effectively bridging the gap created by the shortage of skills in the domain. Allan explains, “The AMSS, the Asset Management Systems & Solutions has six modules covering the full property investment cycle from investment, leasing, budgeting, risk management, portfolio management to deal with structuring of key real estate sectors i.e. retail, office, hotel, sales and mixed use. Clients can opt for modules that fit their requirement with great flexibility. With visual friendly and intuitive features, the design simplifies complex computation for the front-end user by enhancing sophisticated technical engineering in the backend coding. The routine input and calculation process of financial modeling becomes easier and is accompanied with immediate output and informative reports. Professionals in China can use our software without much of financial background and training.”

The Asset management motto developed by Bridge5Asia starts with market research to ascertain that pricing and petition are accurate. After that, it goes through space optimization, tenant mixing, cost forecast steps, which allows for the IRR forecasting and asset return management. The company has automated all the functions into the software to deliver return driven asset management motto. The company is now actively working on incorporating Big Data Analytics and Artificial Intelligence (AI) capabilities into its asset management software. Furthermore, a strong foothold in Chinese and Singaporean markets provides enough impetus for the company to plan gradual expansion into the international markets in the coming years.