In June 2000, this Fortune 100 Automotive Parts Manufacturer chose UGL Equis to manage its 95-million-square foot international portfolio -- the largest real estate portfolio ever to be awarded to a single service provider. Under the agreement, UGL Equis provides strategic planning, portfolio management, transaction advisory, corporate finance, data management and audit & recovery services.

When this company spun off from its parent in 1999, it became the world’s largest supplier of automotive parts, managing 216,000 employees, 179 wholly owned manufacturing sites, 43 joint ventures, 53 customer centers and sales offices, and 31 technical centers in 43 countries.

Since UGL Equis assumed responsibility for this client's real estate portfolio, we have rationalized the global portfolio, balanced the firm’s needs against its current assets, and are developing financing alternatives that will best suit the company’s evolution.

Under the agreement, the company’s corporate real estate staff became part of UGL Equis, joining a team of more than 30 professionals dedicated to the real estate portfolio. UGL Equis also took over management of third party resources necessary to run the portfolio. For example, we manage EDS, the vendor in charge of maintaining the Horizon lease administration database.

The goals for the outsourcing were to:

• Increase real estate savings and cost avoidance;
• Reduce the overall cost of the real estate department;
• Obtain strategic planning services;
• Populate and organize a comprehensive database;
• Obtain greater flexibility through scalable resources of a service provider;
• Establish real estate metrics and provide trend analysis;
• Obtain access to personnel with advanced skill sets in different areas; and Provide more advancement opportunities for real estate personnel.

Since the partnership began, the team has made significant progress toward these goals and has accomplished the following:

• Reduced internal real estate headcount by 40%;
• Reduced department budget by 21%;
• Acquired personnel with more advanced skill sets in locations across the US and Sao Paulo, Singapore, London, and Juarez, Mexico;
• Acquired ability to tap into advanced UGL Equis financial analysis and Treasury expertise; and
• Increased real estate lease savings and cost avoidance.

In addition, after 1 year, UGL Equis saved the client $8.5 million in annual occupancy expenses and:

• Avoided $9.6 million in costs;
• Populated and organized lease database that combined real estate and facilities databases;
• Achieved a 16% savings in rental expenses in 2001 through lease terminations and rent reductions.
• Established files for 240 leased properties globally and additional 350 owned properties; and
• Established real estate metrics and provide trend analysis (e.g., cost /SF, cost per employee, cost of vacant space, cost of real estate/per item produced).