2009 Jury
Otis was hired in September 2013 as the President of the Board of PPM. He is responsible for the asset management for Polonia I and Polonia II, the origination and execution of new business in Poland, as well as the managerial oversight of Peakside’s office in Warsaw. He has over 20 years of experience in the real estate industry and has executed transactions and functioned as a fiduciary in North America, Europe and Asia. He was until recently the Co-Head/Managing Director of KSP Real Estate Investment Management. From 2005 to 2012, Mr. Spencer was active as Managing Director/Co-Head Europe and member of the Investment Committee with Heitman. During this time he directed the Portfolio Management for Heitman’s European Private Equity group and was the Portfolio Manager for Heitman European Property Partners IV. In addition to his portfolio management responsibilities, Mr. Spencer was active in originating transactions and capital raising efforts as well as contributing to the strategic development of Heitman’s European platform. Prior to Heitman, Otis worked for ABP Investments (“ABP”) in the Netherlands where he was a Senior Portfolio Manager. In this capacity, he was responsible for sourcing, structuring and managing non-listed real estate investments on behalf of ABP’s European and Asia Pacific Strategic Funds. During his time at ABP, Mr. Spencer identified and completed ABP’s first real estate private equity investments in Central Europe and Asia. Otis graduated from the University of California Berkeley with a master’s degree in business administration with a concentration in finance and real estate. He also has master’s degree in real estate designation from the Universiteit van Amsterdam. Mr. Spencer holds a dual citizenship from the Netherlands and the United States, and is based in Warsaw, Poland. As a civil engineer Alfred started his professional career from the roots – working several years as a site manager in a medium-size German/Bavarian company. He is continuing a family tradition representing the third generation working in the construction management. His professional experience began in Poland in 1998 with the position of a STRABAG’s site manager of M1 Shopping Centre in Bytom. His outstanding achievements contributed to his promotion in 2004 to a Member of the Board of STRABAG General Construction & Engineering Division. Since January 2013 Alfred is also responsible for Transportation Infrastructure and he is very well linked to other CEE and SEE markets via the STRABAG Group. Under the leadership of Alfred Watzl STRABAG and their almost 3500 employees were awarded the CEEQA Construction Company of the Year 2005, 2009 and 2012. Colin Waddell has been working for CBRE in CEE for over 12 years. Over the last six years Colin has been integral in setting-up and expanding CBRE’s platform in the region which has meant that CBRE now operate as a full-service entity in CEE. Colin’s geographical experience covers all of the principal regional markets and his professional career involves a range of investment consultancy, brokerage and valuation work (including development consultancy) over all sectors of the property industry, up and above his management duties. Before entering the Central & Eastern European market, prior to CBRE, Colin worked for King Sturge in Edinburgh and London for four years. Colin graduated from Heriot Watt University, Edinburgh with an honours degree in Estate Management and is a Member of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors. Hadley has been successfully operating in Poland for over 20 years where he is recognised for growing businesses and consistently outperforming the market place. Before establishing MDC² he used to hold the role of the founding CEO of EPP – the largest owner of shopping centres in Poland (EUR 2.6bn of GAV). Prior to EPP he was a Managing Partner for Eastern Europe for Colliers International where he built the best logistics and industrial space agency business in Central and Eastern Europe. In 2021 Hadley was the recipient of the prestigious CEEQA Lifetime Achievement in Real Estate award. Jason is both the Managing Partner of BSC Real Estate Advisors, overseeing the operational running of the business, as well as the Partner responsible for Office, Industrial and Capital Markets advisory. Jason started his career in London where he trained as a Chartered Surveyor and since 1998 has been working on real estate transactions in Ukraine, the Czech Republic and Poland. Markus has eighteen years experience in corporate banking and for more than 15 years has been a leading real estate financier in Central Europe, principally with RHEINHYP and EUROHYPO. In 1997 he set up RHEINHYP’s Central European property lending division, and in 2001 he helped to set up its US operations. In 2002 Markus took over EUROHYPO’s CEE division, including Austria, and served as Head of CEE & Northern Europe and Israel from 2007 to mid 2012. During this time he sourced more than EUR 10bln of CRE debt, with the largest refinancing in CEE of approx. EUR 750mln. Martin is responsible for real estate lending across continental Europe for Helaba Landesbank Hesse-Thuringia, which belongs to the German savings bank network. Based at the bank’s Frankfurt headquarter, he manages the origination for Central Europe and Benelux. Martin has worked on a wide range of financing transactions in the past and has more than 22 years of real estate experience in the European markets. Helaba currently manages a loan book of around EUR 34 bn in commercial real estate, almost half of this amount representing the bank’s international business in Europe and the US. Helaba’s relationship-oriented strategy has remained unchanged for years and is consistently directed towards its target markets. Pawel is a partner at global law firm Dentons and Chairman of the European Real Estate Group of more than 250 lawyers across twelve countries. He is one of the most widely recognized and respected real estate M&A and investment professionals in Poland and Central and Eastern Europe. Pawel acts as legal counsel to numerous institutional clients, including investors, developers, lenders, construction companies and occupiers. He has unique expertise in the office, retail and hotel sectors. In professional practice for over twenty years, Pawel was involved in structuring real estate investments in Poland back in the early days of the free market economy. Pawel is repeatedly recommended as a leader in the field of real estate law by both Polish publications (namely Forbes and Rzeczpospolita) as well as international legal directories and guides (such as The Legal 500, Best Lawyers, European Legal Experts or Who’s Who Legal). In 2013, for the second time, he was named Professional of the Year at the CEE Quality Awards organized by Imagine Live Media in cooperation with the Financial Times. Robert is the CEO & Co-Owner of Panattoni Europe, UK and India. Panattoni is the largest logistics developer in Europe with completed portfolio of over 19 million sqm of completed floor space in the UK, Germany, France, Netherlands, Austria, Hungary, Czechia, Poland, Spain, Slovakia, Sweden and Italy. In the last five years Panattoni has been ranked as the top logistics developer by PropertyEU magazine due to having delivered the largest volume of space in Europe. Before joining Panattoni, Robert Dobrzycki was employed by industrial developer Menard Doswell & Co. In 2005, he established Panattoni headquarters in Poland for the region of Central and Eastern Europe, became CEO of Panattoni for Europe in 2014, and assumed his current role as CEO and Co-Owner in 2021. He is a Fellow of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (FRICS) and holds a master’s degree in business management from Warsaw University. Robert is a Partner and a member of the Investment Committee at Europa Capital. Robert is the Head of Investments for the Pan-European fund series. Robert also has oversight of all acquisitions and asset management in Central Europe (Poland, Czech Republic and Hungary) and has been investing in the region for Europa Capital for over 20 years. Before co-founding Europa Capital in 1998, Robert worked at St Quintin and Herring Baker Harris in London. Robert is a Member of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors and received a BSc in Land Management from Reading University, and an MBA from the University of Cape Town, South Africa. Robert has worked in the commercial real estate industry since 1982 based in cities including London, Brussels and currently Prague and Bucharest since 1991. After an agency background with Healey & Baker in 1993 (now Cushman & Wakefield), he created the development and asset management company Portland Trust in 1998. Portland Trust has been in partnership with US property and fund management group Ares Management, L.P. (formerly AREA Property Partners) since 1999. Ares currently has assets under management of over $160 billion and provides equity capital jointly with Portland Trust to purchase development projects, under-managed assets with refurbishment potential and undercapitalised companies in central and eastern Europe. Together, Ares and Portland Trust have developed or refurbished over 800,000 m2 of commercial space in the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Romania. Better known projects include Metropole Zlicin (one of the first major malls in Prague), Bucharest Business Park (the first A-class business park in Bucharest), Floreasca Park (which in 2014 won the CEEQA Office Development of the Year and the CEEQA RealGreen Building of the Year, CEEQA Green Leadership Award and CIJ Investment transaction of the year in 2015), Oregon Park (which won the CEEQA Overall Building of the Year SEE in 2018) and more recently the new ING Bank HQ, EXPO Business Park in Bucharest.Industry Operators
Otis Spencer, President, Peakside Polonia Management
Quality Awards
Alfred Watzl, Member of the Board, Strabag
Christian Fojtl, Member of the Management Board, Warimpex
Colin Waddell, Managing Director Poland, CBRE
Eli Alroy, Chairman, GTC
Hadley Dean, Founder, MDC²
Jason Sharman, Managing Partner, BSC Real Estate Advisors
Jorg Banzhaf, Managing Director, ECE
Markus Leininger, Managing Partner, SIMRES Real Estate
In October 2012 Markus became a partner in SIMRES Real Estate, a Luxembourg based real estate private equity boutique. He serves as a director of Revetas and Pradera in Luxembourg and is a member of the Advisory Board of Grand City Properties SA. He is a respected voice on commercial real estate issues at international market conferences and events.
Martin Erbe, Head of International Real Estate Finance Continental Europe, Helaba
Patrick Delcol, Managing Director Poland, DTZ
Pawel Debowski, Partner, Chairman Real Estate Europe, Dentons
His outstanding and sustained contribution to the CEE real estate sector has resulted over the years in multiple recognitions as the leader in this field. Chambers Europe legal directory rates him as a Band Star. It lauds Pawel as “a brand of his own”. He is singled out as “one of the icons of the market,” and “a very technical, robust lawyer,” whose “reputation speaks for itself.”
Robert Dobrzycki FRICS, Chief Executive Officer Europe, Panattoni
Robert Martin, Partner, Head of Investments, Europa Capital
Robert Neale FRICS, Chief Executive Officer, Portland Trust
