SINGAPORE (REUTERS) - GIC, Singapore's sovereign wealth fund, said it had signed a deal to buy a logistics real estate portfolio from funds managed by private-equity firm Apollo Global Management's affiliates for about 950 million euros (S$1.43 billion).

The Maximus portfolio totals over 1 million square metres (sq m) of industrial space from 28 logistics assets across Europe, including in Germany, Poland, Slovakia, Netherlands, Belgium and Austria, GIC said in a statement on Friday (Dec 13). The acquisition is expected to close in the first quarter of 2020.

GIC said the deal would help scale up its P3 logistics platform. The sovereign fund bought P3 Logistic Parks in 2016 for 2.4 billion euros (S$3.6 billion) from TPG Real Estate and its partner Ivanhoe Cambridge. The deal was said to be the largest for European real estate that year.

P3, headquartered in Prague, manages and develops European warehouse properties, and has operations in 13 countries, with over 5.3 million sq m assets under management and land bank for further development. The Maximus portfolio, which will be managed by P3 and integrated into its pan-European warehouse platform, has a diversified tenant base, including companies in the automotive, e-mobility, distribution, e-commerce, and last-mile logistics sectors.

"As a long-term value investor, logistics continues to be an attractive sector for GIC. It is set to keep growing, supported by strong e-commerce growth, and we expect it to generate steady income streams in the long run," said Lee Kok Sun, chief investment officer at GIC Real Estate.

P3 Logistics Park chief investment officer Otis Spencer said the firm continues to actively look for further investment deals to strengthen its position as one of Europe's top developers and managers of logistics properties.