The investment will be through share purchases and providing a loan for the luxury and serviced apartment development arm of Vietnam's biggest property developer VIC.
Vinhomes Times City.
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Founded in 2014, Vinhomes offers serviced apartments and villas to residents in the country's biggest cities. It now owns many brands Vinhomes Royal City (Hanoi); Vinhomes Times City (Hanoi); Vinhomes Riverside (Hanoi); Vinhomes Dong Khoi (Ho Chi Minh City).
Formerly known as Hanoi Southern City Development, Vinhomes has cancelled its registration on the Unlisted Public Market Company (UPCoM) in mid 2017, due to the fact that the company was no longer a public company. In early 2018, Hanoi Southern City Development increased its equity from VND2 trillion (US$87.6 million) to VND28.3 trillion (US$1.2 billion) and renamed to Vinhomes.
The increase in equity was facilitated through the merging of VIC's two subsidiaries, namely Tan Lien Phat Construction Investment and Vinhomes Management. Tan Lien Phat Construction Investment was the project owner of Vinhomes Central Park in Ho Chi Minh and some other projects.
Vingoup in February said that it is planning a spinoff of its luxury residential arm that could raise as much as US$1 billion, which will mark a strong run of IPOs in the country.
Vietnam's biggest property developer recently has picked four foreign banks for the planned IPO of Vinhomes including Citigroup, Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank and Morgan Stanley.
The IPO of Vinhomes would follow last year's listing of Warburg Pincus-backed Vincom Retail, Vietnam's biggest shopping mall operator and also a unit of Vingroup, which raised roughly US$700 million.
GIC is one of the largest investors in Vietnam's market, notably with investments in Masan Group (5% shares), Vietjet Air (5%), Vinamilk (0.7%), FPT (3.5%), Pan Group, Vinasun, and others, with total capital of nearly VND15 trillion (US$660 million).
In addition to Vinhomes, GIC is considering investments in Techcombank and Vietcombank.
