Lineage Eyes New European Deals After $475 Million Spree in 2020

(Bloomberg) -- Lineage Logistics, one of the world's largest owners of cold-storage warehouses, spent roughly $475 million to expand further in Europe last year, amassing a combined 90 million cubic feet of capacity.

The Novi, Michigan-based real estate investment trust isn't done. It will seek to find new European deals in 2021, with the goal of deploying more capital than it did last year, according to Mike McClendon, president of international operations at Lineage.

“This is a continuation of our strategy to grow across the U.K. and all of Europe, focusing on key port locations and population centers within the temperature-controlled supply chain,” he said in an interview.

Lineage struck deals last year in the Netherlands, Denmark, Belgium, Poland and Norway. It targeted locations that are core to food production, McClendon said.

With its new European bets, including the acquisition of Danish company Coldstar, Lineage's footprint now spans over 2.1 billion cubic feet of temperature-controlled capacity in more than 340 facilities across 15 countries.

Read more: Lineage Logistics Makes $500 Million Bet on Refrigerated Rail

The company, which competes against Americold Realty Trust, raised $1.6 billion in September from investors such as Oxford Properties Group, BentallGreenOak and Dan Sundheim's D1 Capital Partners in a transaction that valued it at $15.5 billion, including debt.

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