The UEM Land-Sunrise deal- revisited.

What has happened to the UEM land buy-in into Sunrise? The value of the buy in was RM 1.4 billion. You bozos don’t think we have forgotten do you?

From the beginning the public did not understand the rationale of UEM land, a member of the UEM group, with its large land bank would want to buy into Sunrise. It’s got Nusajaya with its 3400 hectares of land and all that.

What has Sunrise got? It’s much touted award winning skills which the UEM boys are so smitten with but think they cannot learn or acquire somewhere else. Its resident architect in chief- Saiful Anuar Abdul Ghani found himself so overwhelmed by Sunrise’s magic? Also, it’s got the Tong Kooi Ong- formerly boss of Phileo Allied. And UEM Land has only got Wan Abdullah Wan Ibrahim. Wan Abdullah who? Pales in comparison to the myth-making Thong of Phileo , the financial wunderkind.

Hence UEM land justified its buy-in of Sunrise being founded on:

* Leveraging on Sunrise Group's robust financial strengths and prospects

* Accelerate UEM Land's own business expansion

* To secure new development projects

* And, to create another Capital Land (Singapore state-own company which is one of Asia's biggest property developers)

The deal would result in:-

* UEM Group's shareholding in UEM Land will fall to around 60%

* Major shareholder of Sunrise will have stake of around 9% in UEM Land

* Creating an enlarged group with combined asset base of over RM5bn

Sunrise has reached its end already. With no more land bank, the only way it can grow further was to entice another suitor to take over. They found one in the able and willing UEM land.

UEM doesn’t have the expertise in luxury development and they don’t have the marketing skills.Are these admissions of incompetence or inverted humility employed to get support?

The deal was founded and justified on the assumption that by buying into Sunrise, UEM land would leverage on the special skills represented by Sunrise. What are those pray tell. Acquiring the art of survival known only to Tong Kooi Ong? Getting the secrets of building high end condominiums? And it accomplishes this by issuing shares worth RM 1.4 billion and by volunteering to reduce UEM’s share in UEM land by at least 40%?

You had the analysts singing praises for the deal- the public was induced into believing that the acquisition would complement UEM Land's lack of expertise in high-rise, high-end property development. This was the rationale that was most perplexing; UEM land can build highways and other award-winnable buildings at KL Sentral, it needs the special skills that could only be found in Sunrise? The skills at Sunrise are not learnable?

The building skills of Sunrise were so unknowable and un-learnable such that, that deficiency can only be resolved by buying over Sunrise for RM 1.4 billion? Why would Sunrise with its award winning constructions principally at Bukit Kiara wants to be gobbled up? Because it can leverage on the large land bank that UEM land has. It knows it can get its hands on EPF money. It also know it can get government backing. And also, because Tong Kooi Ong wants to shed his buddy to Anwar image. Because it knows since it has the skills, it can dominate the new organizational structure of UEM Land-Sunrise by controlling the strategic and key components of the revised corporate entity. Tong will control the development side of the business. I hear he is revising whatever UEM Land has planned thus far. So how does UEM land learn the skills from Tong if they are not in the driver’s seat?

Tong will feature prominently in the deal through his Casa Unggul Sdn Bhd being its single largest shareholder with a 24.41% stake. The Employees Provident Fund Board has 12.61% voting shares in Sunrise.

Since then, did the people in UEM Land and UEM expand their knowledge about to how to construct high end condominiums? Can we ever imagine- a conglomerate and a business entity with so many fingers in so many pies ( they have actually run out of fingers by the way) claiming pubescent innocence that they don’t how to do what Sunrise has been doing? Yet they can build impressive looking buildings, highways and so forth. You mean we have been paying humongous remuneration packages to bozos running UEM and UEM land?

Wasn’t this the big rationale when the public asked why must UEM land park their assets in Sunrise? They said they wanted to learn the trick in building up market properties like Sunrise does at their Kiara complexes.

Now, I ask you, if we want to learn the insides of the business which have made Sunrise a topnotch name, were do we start? We will start at the operations right? At the marketing department right? Because these are the two things UEM Land says it doesn’t have.

Does UEM Land have its people there? Its COO is Lum Tuck Ming. Its boss of Strategic Marketing is Edward Sutton. Didn’t UEM say it doesn’t have the operational skills and marketing expertise? Instead at UEM Land we have so many despondent executives resigned in their beliefs, they are inferior that people at Sunrise.

So, can we ask UEM land, have they placed their people in the operations department and marketing departments? Or are they contented at having their people placed as supporting casts in the support service’s department- accounts and bean counting and other clerical functions.

If they haven’t, then their much publicized declaration that they are injecting UEM Land assets into Sunrise as a means to cultivate and develop technical knowledge was all bull manure. They were probably at it, because some people at UEM made tons of money for supporting the decision to inject UEM land assets into Sunrise. Sunrise hasn’t got any land bank left baby- you are giving them an extended lease. UEM could have partnered another government linked company such as Sime Darby or anyone else. Sime Darby can build high end condominiums too right.

So if it were not a crime, I would pull all those responsible for maneuvering the entry of UEM land into Sunrise , line them up and have them shot one by one. Perhaps with an elephant gun.

Posted by sakmongkol AK47