ARTICLE
17 March 2014

MIPIM Day 2 - Off To A flyer

Following a 'home team' dinner yesterday evening, and the opportunity to touch base with the rest of the Deloitte Real Estate guys, things kicked off in earnest today.
United Kingdom Real Estate and Construction

Well, I said I had high expectations, and so far we're very much on track (despite being with an inch of losing my wallet and passport on the way in to Cannes last night)!

Following a 'home team' dinner yesterday evening, which was a great opportunity to touch base with the rest of the Deloitte Real Estate guys, things kicked off in earnest today. After dusting off the effects of last night's Chateauneuf du Pape, I made my way this morning to see Sean Beech (Head of Deloitte Real Estate in the UK regions) kick off the proceedings at an Atlantic Gateway breakfast event, sponsored by Deloitte, at which Sir Howard Bernstein and Mayor Joe Anderson focused on how Manchester and Liverpool can work together for mutual economic advantage. It was standing room only - a testimony to the interest and support of the business community to the combined Liverpool-Manchester mission - and the buzz of MIPIM was, despite the early hour, unmistakeable. Sir Howard wasted no time in going for the jugular of UK economic policy, arguing in no uncertain terms for the need to rebalance the UK economy, typified by the massive inequity of transport investment in London and the SE compared to the rest of the country. Other key themes included the case for a strong regional planning framework to support coordinated, strategic investment in clusters of economic activity and innovation (spot the irony in that one) and the "once in a generation" opportunity to address passenger capacity constraints and more productive freight distribution through HS2, with a strong push on the need for a proper UK freight strategy. 


Following a couple of short, sharp but productive client meetings, I then made my first schoolboy error of the week by failing to plan in enough time to get between appointments. I belatedly rocked in to what promised to be one of the highlight events of the week, a panel discussion on the Metropolitan Revolution with the inimitable Bruce Katz (@bruce_katz) and the Chair of the UK Cities Commission, Jim O'Neill. A-list stuff. The discussion centred on the need to stimulate city-level innovation ecosystems. I missed most of Bruce's presentation, but luckily had seen him speak back in the UK a few weeks ago. Some key points: a whole generation of new industries is being driven by corporate and private collaboration; sprawl is dead; density isn't; technology is fundamentally disrupting business models; federal government structures are defunct; cities are the here and now and future and need to be underpinned by comprehensive strategies driven by networks of leaders. There was, without doubt, an overwhelming sense of  the need for a "Metropolitan Revolution" amongst the audience, in the need for a recalibration of working arrangements between cities and central government in the UK. 

My next stop was lunch with the pending COO of a top 10 global real estate investment business. Really great to hear his intellectually engaging perspective on how sustainability is impacting on their approach across Europe and beyond (much higher up the C-suite agenda than 12 months ago), and managed to drive some great opportunities for our sustainability, valuation and property management teams. 

Now, it's straight into back-to-back client meetings before dinner with an investment client tonight. Half-way through the first day, and I'm shattered already! Time to catch my second wind...

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