Ikea plans to open a new furniture store in central Vienna, next to the Westbahnhof railway station with no parking place for cars. The construction works started in January 2020 and will be finished by next year.

Alpha Bank Romania has sold a 60,000 sqm plot of land in Timișoara to German retail chain Lidl and two other investors. The Romanian bank previously planned to develop a shopping centre there, Ziarul Financiar reported.

Union Investment has agreed to acquire two planned hotel properties in Kraków and Katowice with a total of 527 rooms. The developer, vendor and future operator of the two midscale hotels, which are scheduled for completion in autumn 2021, is UBM. The purchase price of the ibis Styles-branded hotel in Kraków and Mercure-branded hotel in Katowice is approximately €86 million in total. Both leases run for 25 years.

Invesco Real Estate has sold two build-to-suit distribution centres in Poland totalling 105,000 sqm to Chinese investment company CGL Investment Holdings Corporation. The sale was made on behalf of Invesco’s strategic opportunities investment programme and the corporate transaction has set new records for the market with assets valued based on a record yield for the Polish logistics market of 4.25%. The purchase price was not disclosed.

Poland's retail market is seeing a slowdown in the pace of shopping centre construction, the growing popularity of the convenience segment and mixed-use projects, as well as further synergy of traditional shopping and technology, according to JLL’s market summary for 2019.

Cavatina Holding has signed a sale agreement for the Equal Business Park office complex in Kraków. The complex comprises four buildings offering a total of over 60,000 sqm of Class A office space. The buyer is a joint venture managed by Apollo-Rida Poland.

Savills World Research says that offices in core city markets around the world will be real estate investors’ focus in 2020, but with opportunities scarce and yields at record lows, many will be forced to look elsewhere. Alternative assets, such as student housing, multi-family, co-living and data centres, will therefore become increasingly mainstream. Globally, Savills says that securing income returns will remain the overarching theme for real estate investment in 2020.

Colliers International Romania has been assigned to provide property management services for the first building of the Equilibrium office project, developed by Skanska in the capital which was handed over last fall. This is the second mandate won by Colliers from Skanska, bringing the total portfolio managed by the company to almost 530,000 sqm of industrial and office spaces.

The area of Budapest’s Arena Mall could grow from its current 42,000 sqm to 60,000 sqm, following the property manager’s application for an extension last December, local daily HVG reports. If the plans are realised, Arena Mall will become the largest shopping centre in Hungary.

Globalworth Real Estate Investment, by buying a 50% stake from Elgan Group, has become the sole shareholder of real estate developer Elgan Offices. The two companies developed the Renault Bucharest Connected (RBC) building located in the western part of Bucharest. Elgan Group is owned by Israeli businessman Simon Roth.