C-NX Tokyo is located less than a half-hour from Tokyo station (Image: Google)
Blackstone is closing out 2025 with another Japan mega-deal, with the US fund manager acquiring a warehouse facility in Tokyo from Nippon Express for around JPY 100 billion ($641 million).
Nippon Express, one of Japan’s largest logistics operators, said on Monday that it has decided to sell Tokyo C-NX, an eight-year-old asset in the capital’s Koto ward, for approximately JPY 100 billion, with the buyer identified as Mizuho Leasing, which frequently acts as an intermediary in large-scale property transactions.
Market sources in Japan identified Blackstone as the ultimate buyer of the 151,345 square metre (1.6 million square foot) warehouse facility, confirming earlier reports by Japan’s Nikkei. With many Japanese corporates putting fresh emphasis on boosting returns amid a wave of buyouts and carve-outs, Nippon Express in a statement tied the asset sale to initiatives to improve financial performance.
“The Company pursues measures to improve ROE (return on equity) and advance growth strategies as part of its initiatives to enhance corporate value during the current business plan period,” Satoshi Horikiri, president and representative director of Nippon Express said. “Here, the Company aims to shift toward high-profit businesses and improve capital profitability through asset replacement by selling low-profit real estate and securing unrealized gains to generate cash for growth investments.”
Coveted Location
Tokyo C-NX is Nippon Express’ largest facility in Japan, with the six-storey complex occupying a 59,504 square metre site. Completed in 2017, the project has 5.5 metre ceiling heights and floor loading capacity of 1.5 tonnes per square metre. Blackstone representatives had not yet replied to inquiries from Mingtiandi regarding the transaction by the time of publication
Daisuke Kitta, head of Japan real estate for Blackstone
The earthquake-resistant structure is located less than a half-hour drive east of Tokyo station and is home to third-party logistics providers such as Nittsu Tokyo and Meitetsu Transportation, with industrial conglomerate Okamura also operating from the facility. In a statement, Mizuho leasing said it expects the purchase agreement for Tokyo C-NX to be executed on 25 December, with the property to change hands on 27 February.
With Blackstone paying the equivalent of JPY 660,742 per square metre for the logistics facility, industry analysts pointed to the property’s proximity to central Tokyo as boosting the value of the asset.
“It is still very much a tale of two cities,” one expert told Mingtiandi. “Grade A locations, such as this asset’s site in Koto-ku, are experiencing tight vacancy and cap rates. In contrast, grade B locations are still facing elevated vacancy and a cap rate gap that can be as wide as 100 basis points.”
The property is also located in close proximity to a Koto ward data centre project which AXA IM Alts acquired in 2020 with the area favoured as a digital infrastructure hub.
Sheds Still in Favour
While many global players have focused their Japan efforts on the living sector, or more recently on office properties, leasing rates for warehouse properties in the Japanese capital have continued to rise this year, with JLL noting that average rents for logistics properties in Greater Tokyo reached JPY 4,724 per tsubo (3.3 square metres) per month by the end of the third quarter, which was up 0.8 percent from a year earlier.
In August this year, Warburg Pincus announced that it had committed around $240 million to buying a pair of Greater Tokyo warehouses for its Japan portfolio, with Mingtiandi having identified the seller of I Missions Park Inzai and Logitres Sano as Mitsui Fudosan Logistics REIT.
Brookfield also bet on Japan logistics this year with the acquisition of a 929,000 square metre logistics site near Nagoya in a deal announced in late January. In March this year SMFL Mirai Partners completed a JPY 21.7 billion buyout of Tokyo-listed warehouse developer CRE Inc.
Deal Streak Continues
While Blackstone had made the news in Japan last month with its purchase of an Osaka hotel from Singapore’s City Developments Ltd for JPY 14 billion, the Tokyo industrial acquisition marks the largest real estate deal which the company has been tied to in a year when US private equity giants have repeatedly made headlines in Japan.
In 2024, Blackstone had notched Japan’s largest-ever real estate acquisition by a foreign investor when it agreed to acquire the Tokyo Garden Terrace Kioicho complex from Seibu Holdings for $2.6 billion.
Blackstone’s US rival Carlyle Group launched its latest play on Japanese real estate assets this week with a tender offer to take private TSE-listed Hogy Medical, with the maker of surgical gowns and masks owning choice sites in Tokyo.
AloJapan.com