AustralianSuper head of property Jack McGougan said the fund’s internal investing strategy would increase its holdings of prime retail assets, particularly in developed markets. 

He said QIC was one of “Australia’s pre-eminent shopping centre investment managers with a proven domestic track record” and that its investment process could be easily replicated in the United States.

QIC managing director of global real estate, Steven Leigh, said the appointment further strengthened QIC’s relationship with AustralianSuper in Australian real estate and that this would extend into the US retail property sector. 

Mr Leigh said QIC was pleased to be building on its US platform, which was established with its recent investment alongside Forest City. 

“AustralianSuper’s support of our strategy and investment capabilities is an important and valued next step for us,” he said. 

“With such a deep opportunity set in the USA across all sectors of retail real estate, we will be assessing a significant amount of deal flow that we will refine and scrutinise in order to meet the investment requirements for AustralianSuper.”

This latest announcement follows the appointment of ISPT by AustralianSuper as manager of the Australian office and retail market and the appointment of Henderson Global Investors as manager for the UK retail market, earlier this year. 

“These mandates are consistent with our long-term strategy to identify attractive core property sectors and best in class investment managers to execute in those sectors”, Mr McGougan said.