OptylonKrea strengthens team in Portugal and sets target of 300 million in new investments

Lisbon, February 3rd, 2022. The pan-Mediterranean Real Estate Development and Investment Management company OptylonKrea has reinforced its team in Portugal with the integration of Ricardo Melo Gonçalves, Head of Real Estate Development, and Frederico Almeida de Carvalho, Business Development Manager.

OptylonKrea, which celebrated its third anniversary in December, reaches the milestone of 30employees, following the strategy of strengthening its commitment in Portugal and increasing its investment volume by 300 million euros in 2022 and 2023.

Ricardo Melo Gonçalves, with more than 20 years of experience in Construction, Rehabilitation and Project Management, was hired as Head of Real Estate Development, after working for one of the largest construction groups in Portugal and for a North American multinational. With a degree in Civil Engineering with specialization in Construction and a post-graduate degree in Conservation and Rehabilitation of Buildings, he has participated in four award-winning projects, two of which in 2021: Best residential building (SIL)and Best rehabilitation project (Construir).

"With 90% of our current investment pipeline in Portugal, we value Portuguese know-how and ingenuity, and look forward to delivering the highest quality real estate products that integrate in the best possible way into their environment," comments William Tonnard, President & COO of OptylonKrea. "With a growing portfolio, Ricardo's integration responds to the need of having a proven real estate professional with us, up to our great challenges. Looking to the future of the company, the sky may be the limit".  

Frederico Almeida de Carvalho, who takes on the role of Business Development Manager, has experience in the financial sector and a broad knowledge of the Real Estate market, having worked at CBRE before joining OptylonKrea. His role will be to structure OptylonKrea's origination activities, generating new investment opportunities to help the company invest the more than 200 million euros of capital available in high street retail and branded residence assets.

"We have recorded strong growth in Portugal and we have no doubt that the success of our young company is due to the team of dedicated professionals we are fortunate to have. We have very ambitious goals for the coming years and felt it was time to strengthen ourselves to ensure we deliver the best results," says Charles Wanecq, CEO of OptylonKrea. "Frederico represents a great asset, and his network and experience will be key in giving us access to more business, as well as properly validating and comparing our investment assumptions in the future."

With a client base that already exceeds 400 investors from more than 30 countries, the Group closed 2021 with a total of 102 thousand square meters in owned and managed assets in Portugal, doubling the previous year's figures. In line with the goal of strengthening its presence in the country and growing its local team, OptylonKrea will soon inaugurate its new state-of-the-art headquarters on Rua Alexandre Herculano, in Lisbon.