By Peter Grant | Wall Street Journal
DTZ, a rapidly growing commercial-real-estate-services firm backed by private-equity giant TPG, has cut a deal to buy Cushman & Wakefield Inc. for $2 billion.
The deal will alter the global commercial-real-estate-services landscape by creating a clear challenger to the two firms that have been dominating the business until now, CBRE Group Inc. and JLL. Numerous firms had been vying for the No. 3 spot but none have come close to CBRE with $9 billion in 2014 revenue and JLL with $5.4 billion.
The combined company, which will have more than $5 billion in annual revenue and 250 offices in more than 50 countries, will keep the Cushman & Wakefield name.
The firm will be run by Brett White, former chief executive of CBRE who helped build that firm into the largest in the world.
Mr. White, who stepped down from CBRE in 2012, recently has been working closely with the TPG venture, which also includes PAG Asia Capital and the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan. In the past six months, the venture also purchased DTZ for $1.05 billion and Washington-based Cassidy Turley in a deal valued at as much as $600 million.
