In 2017 20 new foreign retail brands entered Poland and over 330,000 sqm of shopping centre space were delivered to market. The retail transaction volume exceeded €1.9 billion. JLL highlighted the results on the retail market in Poland for 2017.

Intercontinental Hotels Group announced the opening of Holiday Inn Warsaw City Centre. Located on the border of Śródmieście and Wola at the junction of Żelazna, Złota and Twarda Streets, the hotel has 256 rooms.

Griffin Real Estate has changed its organisational and management structure, propertynews.pl reports. Founder and former CEO Przemyslaw Krych has sold its stake in Griffin Real Estate, having previously resigned from all positions held in the company and related entities. The move follows Krych’s detainment by Poland’s Central Anticorruption Bureau in December on unspecified charges. 

The Polish retail market witnessed a large number of interesting developments throughout 2017. Magdalena Sadal, Head of Retail Research and Advisory at Cresa Poland presented an outlook for 2018.

Panattoni Europe is to build a distribution and online store service centre for SMYK. The facility, which will feature 70,000 sqm at full build-out, will be erected at the Panattoni Central European Logistics Hub in Łódź. The investment will be launched in early January and will proceed in a number of phases. The first 26,000 sqm is scheduled for commissioning in June 2018. The lease transaction was mediated by JLL.Panattoni Europe is to build a distribution and online store service centre for SMYK. The facility, which will feature 70,000 sqm at full build-out, will be erected at the Panattoni Central European Logistics Hub in Łódź. The investment will be launched in early January and will proceed in a number of phases. The first 26,000 sqm is scheduled for commissioning in June 2018. The lease transaction was mediated by JLL.

Skanska invests €50 million in the second phase of Generation Park, an office project located in Warsaw, Poland. The second building, with a total leasable area of about 18,300 square meters, will comprise 16 stories above ground and two stories of underground parking. The investment will also include four underground parking levels for the planned third building.

Blackstone Property Partners Europe Lower Fund 2 plans to acquire 24 logistics centres from Goodman. The buyer intends to buy assets and shares in several companies which own properties in Poland, France and Germany.

Catalyst Capital, a European real estate investment and fund management firm, has bought Nobilis Business House from Echo Investment for €44 million. The building, located on Marii Skłodowskiej-Curie Street in Wrocław, was completed in late 2016.

In 2017 the large number of office projects delivered across Poland filled up quickly as occupier demand remained robust. Traditional drivers of demand were joined by emerging trends that are shaping the future of the office market and commercial real estate as a whole. Bolesław Kołodziejczyk, Phd, Head of Research & Advisory at Cresa Poland analysed the Polish office market.

Carrefour opened a new hypermarket in Warsaw. Its customers will be able to take advantage of its digital solutions, as well as range of new commercial concepts, including m-commerce type services, a restaurant right in the heart of the store and a line of checkouts that is not quite what they'll be expecting.