Amazon Development Center leases two lakh sq ft office space in Pune’s Kharadi
Ecommerce major Amazon’s software and support services company Amazon Development Center (India) has leased an office space spread over nearly 200,000 sq ft in information technology (IT) special economic zone (SEZ) Gera Commerzone in Pune’s Kharadi locality.
The company has picked up the office space spread over four floors for a tenure of 10 years with total rentals of over Rs 208 crore, including rental escalations.
The agreement includes a clause to escalate monthly rentals by 15% after every three years. Amazon Development Center (India), as a tenant, will also have a lock-in period of three years.
Gera Commerzone is a joint venture between Pune-based developer Gera Developments and K Raheja Corp’s listed real estate investment trust (REIT) Mindspace Business Parks REIT. The project is spread over 25.8 acres and it has a total leasable area of around 3 million sq ft, of which 50% is delivered and leased, while an additional 1.5 million sq ft is currently under-construction.
Mindspace Business Parks REIT and Gera Developments had entered into a joint venture to develop this project and has so far leased the office spaces to large global companies including British Petroleum, Barclays, UPS, Mindcrest, Maveric and Allstate.
Amazon Development Center (India) has paid Rs 1.79 crore as stamp duty for the lease transaction that was concluded and registered on January 13, showed the documents accessed through Propstack.
Amazon Development Center (India) has operations spread across the world and its development centres in India are in cities including Bengaluru, Chennai and Hyderabad.
ET’s email queries to Amazon India and K Raheja Corp remained unanswered until the time of going to press.
In October, Amazon Data Services India entered into an agreement with realty developer K Raheja Corp’s subsidiary Newfound Properties and Leasing to pick up a commercial tower with built up area of 451,000 sq ft through a long-term sub lease of over 15 years in Thane to set up a data centre.
The commercial office segment, which was significantly impacted by the pandemic, has made a strong comeback in the last 3-4 quarters, supported by strong economic growth, increased hiring and a return to the office trend, keeping the office sector buoyant.
Office real estate witnessed a strong recovery in demand despite the geopolitical challenges, recording gross office leasing of 51.6 million sq ft, a rise of 36% from a year ago, showed a recent report. New office space completions also grew 28% to 49.4 million sq ft.
Office rental levels were stable or grew across all markets during the period, marking it as the second half-yearly period since the first half of 2019 that this has occurred. Bengaluru and Pune office markets grew the most during the second half of 2022 at 11% and 7% on-year, respectively.