Chinese Company Shanghai Zendai Invest R80bn in South African Property Development

The South African Commercial and Industrial Property Market has recently experienced an injection 

of investment capital from the East with Chinese firm Shanghai Zendai purchasing 1600ha of land 

from explosives company AECI. They plan to build a mini city which will see the Chinese firm invest 

approximately R80bn and create 24 000 direct jobs over the next 10 to 15 years.

 

Annenberg Property Group first had interest from the East in 2000 when Dudley Annenberg of 

Annenberg Property Group sold a property in Airport Industria to Japanese owned NGK ceramics. 

This lead to an investment of more than R100 million which was the largest investment by a 

Japanese company in the Western Cape at the time.

 

Annenberg recalls “The negotiations were challenging as the Japanese do business differently to the 

way we operate. It took 6 months of negotiations to conclude the deal which we were told had been 

expedited, as usually such a deal could take as long as 2 years to come to fruition."

 

Annenberg Property Group have noted a spike in enquiries from Chinese companies looking to 

establish or expand their business operations in Cape Town. Their interests range from Chinese 

retail outlets selling cheap imported Chinese goods, to manufacturing and assembly plants catering 

for the green energy market. Andries Louw from Annenberg Property Group commented that "The 

language barrier, lack of FICA documentation and perceived “flight risk” of Chinese tenants are some 

of the obstacles that have to be overcome, but when the right processes are followed, many of the 

risks can be mitigated and we have to date not had any problems with the Chinese tenants we have 

placed.”

 

Further information on the Shanghai Zendai investment project can be found here:

29 Nov 2013
Author Andries Louw