Cambridge's Real Estate Boom

Cambridge and Grosvenor establish a major partnership

Jeremy Newsum, Chief Executive of the Grosvenor Group and Professor Sir Alec Broers, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge sign the professorship agreement.

With the support of Grosvenor Group, the University has appointed its first Professor of Real Estate Finance. This new development was formally marked today, Friday 12 January, with the signing of an agreement by Jeremy Newsum, Chief Executive of the Grosvenor Group, and Professor Sir Alec Broers, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge.

Professor James Shilling has taken up his post in the Department of Land Economy. He was the Chair of Real Estate Finance and Urban Economics at the University of Wisconsin's Business School.

The Grosvenor Group, through the Westminster Foundation, the Duke of Westminster's charitable foundation, has agreed to fund the professorship, which will be called the Grosvenor Professorship of Real Estate Finance.

Real estate finance is an increasingly important area of academic study. The UK property industry is changing rapidly - mergers are taking place amongst the largest firms and they are moving into a global marketplace. As they do so, their traditional approach, based on property valuation, is being superseded by a North American model based on finance-led programmes and market analysis.

Head of the Land Economy Department, Professor Malcolm Grant, said that Grosvenor Group's extremely generous support will enable the University to establish a centre of excellence in commercial real estate that would collaborate closely with the North American business schools who are already specialising in real estate and urban economics.

"Our focus will be global, with particular emphasis on the fast-growing economies, the internationalisation of the industry, the various capital structures employed and the opportunity to harness real estate for economic development in developed and developing countries. It is a very exciting development in the history of the department," he said.

Grosvenor Group's Chief Executive, Jeremy Newsum, believes this is an excellent opportunity for the property industry.

"Grosvenor has always been committed to supporting high standards of academic achievement within the property industry and collaboration between the academic and business worlds. We believe that this new programme will have very real benefits for our business internationally," he said.

The Department is in discussions with Wharton and MIT and will be launching a new state-of-the-art postgraduate programme in real estate finance aimed at students and professionals from around the world. In addition to this gift, the Foundation has endowed a professorial fellowship at Pembroke College.