CEO Insights Magazine

Real estate comprises the largest asset class globally. And especially with the growth in digital technology, urbanization, the emphasis on sustainability, and affordable building, the industry is at the peak of its evolution. Occupiers, investors, and service providers are thinking and acting in new ways to keep up with society’s changing relationship with the real estate industry. Trent Iliffe, as Co-CEO of LOGOS, a dynamic and growing logistics specialist, is helping companies throughout this evolving journey, keeping them one step ahead of the industry.

Previously, before co-founding LOGOS Trent was the Regional Director with LaSalle Investment Management, responsible for Industrial real estate investment in China and the Asia Pacific where he successfully negotiated Joint Ventures, Development Management, Asset Management, and Sale and Purchase Agreements. Trent is also known for establishing JLL's China Industrial Business leading a team of 60 employees in seven offices around China.

He is leveraging an industrial & logistics property industry career spanning over 30 years to spearhead high-value teams across Australia, China, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam, India, Korea, Japan and New Zealand, sourcing land and facilities, and developing and managing assets for the world’s leading investors and customers. Let’s hear it from him.

What was your inspiration behind establishing LOGOS in 2010?

The reason we established LOGOS was to help make Australia familiar with the concept of a logistics only real estate platform. I had recently come back to Australia from living and working in China, which had global leaders in logistics real estate development businesses. It is a relatively simple real estate class, with the same customer base across the country and region, therefore you could take the same relationship and growth organically together. At that time in Australia, the logistics only real estate sector wasn’t established and I realized there was a good opportunity to bring the concept of logistics real estate to the Australian market. In 2010 we acquired our first logistics real estate portfolio in Australia with assets in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne, and Perth.

Tell us about your flagship offerings and what are the unique propositions that you offer to clients?

The DNA of our business has always been around our customers. Hence, we focus on providing tailored service and cutting-edge industrial, logistics, and infrastructure property solutions to support our customer's growth and success. We are known for our services in the logistics property and data center real estate, providing innovative solar, intermodal, and infrastructure solutions. We have a presence in 10 countries where we identify locations that capitalize on the market’s evolving opportunities. We develop assets tailored to our customers’ needs. From conception to completion, we successfully develop logistics property projects across the Asia Pacific region. We work closely with customers to maximize the value of every asset developing tailored solutions that address emerging needs from site functionality to lease expansions and new site selections.

What are the factors you take into account when developing effective corporate growth strategies?

When we are assessing to go into a country, we often spend a couple of years looking at the economy trying to make sense of whether we can build a similar quality building that we build in  China and Australia. We then work out if we can get enough scale in those countries to attract our capital partners' interest. Once we have built the assets, we look for liquidity in those markets; taking them from development vehicles to long-term core vehicles so that we can continue to manage and operate those assets with our customers in the long run. While setting up teams in those countries, we often use our regional resources that we have set up over time to help support our local employees who may not have had the level of experience or exposure that we have in a mature market like Australia. This way we help our employees to learn, grow, and work together to build up their experience so that they can eventually run without the oversight of the regional business.

Tell us about your leadership approach.

As a leader, I believe in leading by example and that hard work, dedication and fair play are the major aspects that lead to success. Our philosophy as an organization is that there is always a solution for the challenges that are thrown at us; we should never give up. We follow an inclusive approach within the organization and work in a culture where every employee, irrespective of the country they are working in acts as one large team and, where possible, with limited hierarchy to encourage taking responsibility for their actions and decisions.

What is the future destination you are headed towards?

As an organization, our operations and DNA are cemented in logistics. I believe there are still reasonably strong tailwinds for the logistics infrastructure development market for the foreseeable future. With the continuing development in technology, we see greater opportunities for product acquisition from retail into the logistics platforms through AI and automation. Adding to that, we are now building data centers on our industrial land and other land parcels, as the world is witnessing significant synergies between the growth of e-commerce, data centers and AI and this goes hand in hand with driving the growth of both our logistics centers and data centers. We have also evolved into an energy transition business. We have built partnerships around the region to help us produce renewable energy solutions for our real estate. Our ambition is to deliver 100 percent carbonneutral buildings by 2030.

Trent Iliffe, Co-CEO, LOGOS

Trent is armed with a property industry career spanning over two and a half decades. He co-founded LOGOS in 2010, a company that today has over US$22.9 billion in assets under management.

QUICK FACTS:

• Awards & Recognition:- Property Council of Australia’s Innovation & Excellence Awards 2023 ‘Best Business or Industrial Park’ for the LOGOS Heathwood Logistics Estate in Australia

• FIABCI Indonesia-REI Excellence Awards 2022 ‘Outstanding Achievement in Industrial’ for the LOGOS Metrolink Logistics Hub (Indonesia)

• Asia Property Awards 2022 ‘Best Green Industrial Development (Asia)’ for the LOGOS Cikarang Logistics Park (Indonesia)

• Asia Property Awards 2022 Indonesia ‘Best Industrial Developer’