DBS on Wednesday signed an agreement to take the lion's share of Marina Bay Financial Centre (MBFC) with a 700,000 sq ft lease.
The lease deal for the bank's new headquarters is the largest in Singapore to-date. The agreement signifies DBS' efforts to consolidate all their facilities in a comprehensive strategic occupancy programme.
The site at Marina Bay has also attracted financial institutions such as Standard Chartered which has already secured a 500,000 sq ft lease.
DBS will now anchor the Marina Bay Financial Centre as the development's sixth and largest tenants.
DBS tenancy brings the development, as a whole, close to 50 percent leased.
The 12-year lease, with options to renew, will begin in 2012 as part of DBS' plans to consolidate and modernise working environments.
Jackson Tai, CEO of DBS, said: "Well there are two things that are important here. First of all, we are securing first-class space for our employees and this allows us to attend to our expansion needs throughout the region. The second thing is that it allows us to lock in what we think are optimised occupancy costs and that is good for our shareholders."
At the signing ceremony on Wednesday, DBS announced that various customer-facing units and trading operations would be moved to Tower 3 at MBFC – the latest tower to be built in the area.
Southeast Asia's largest lender is also the first tenant to sign for Phase Two of the development which comprises a 48-storey commercial tower and luxury accommodation. DBS will take 22 floors of the luxury building.
The new building will be the work of Hong Kong Land Ltd., Cheung Kong (Holdings) Ltd. and Keppel Land Ltd.
In addition, further operations will be moved to a 500,000 sq ft space at Changi Business Park.
Mr Tai said: "DBS' various customer-facing units and trading operations will be consolidated into MBFC. Our strategic operations programme also includes the re-location of various core support functions to a purpose-built nine-storey building at Changi Business Park near the Expo MRT Station. That will be in 2010. The business park site has a permissible ground floor area of about half a million sq ft and will be developed in phases."
In October, DBS signed a lease for more than 220,000 sq ft of office space at One Island East – a 70-storey building in Hong Kong. DBS will be the anchor tenant and the move will commence in 2008. - CNA/so
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