Singapore Advocacy Committee

As the Head of Investor Services, Asia Pacific at Cushman & Wakefield, Dennis Yeo is responsible for growing the company’s client relationships and extending its full suite of best-in-class property services to developers, investors, multi-national corporate clients, funds and institutions. With more than three decades of real estate and leadership experience, he is a highly regarded senior property professional in the industry and is known for his in-depth professional expertise and insights.

His professional expertise is on the logistics and industrial sector, with accumulated experience dated from 1991. He leads Cushman & Wakefield’s APAC practice group for Logistics & Industrial, where he connects and drives collaboration within the industrial teams across the region to capture business opportunities in the market, encompassing distribution centres, data centres, cold storage and warehouse facilities.

Dennis is well-versed in real estate investment trusts (REITs) and is activity involved in advising corporations on matters pertaining to REITs, as well as the transaction of properties to property funds and trust. Over the years, he has built up an impressive network of clients who would engage him and his team for sound real estate advice. Based in Singapore, Dennis has also established a strong media and industry profile, having been regularly quoted in real estate media articles and presented at many industry events.

Prior to leading Investor Services for Asia Pacific, he was Cushman & Wakefield’s Chief Executive for Singapore and South East Asia, working closely with a team of corporate real estate professionals to steer the firm’s growth in the region.

Mr. Christian Bernasconi is a Founding Partner of B&I Capital AG and is based in Singapore where he acts a group co-CIO and head of the research office. Christian has over 27 years of experience as an Asian and Japanese equities specialist and has been based in Switzerland and Singapore over his career. Prior to co-founding B&I Capital in 2007, Christian was an Executive Director at UBS and established the Japan and Asian Equity Sales platform and was part of the Global Real Estate (RE) Team in Zurich. Before joining UBS in 2000, Christian was with W.I. Carr Far East Limited, Paribas Asia Equity and Yamaichi Securities. He received a Bachelors degree in Political Economy of Industrial Societies at the University of California at Berkeley.

Headquartered in Zurich with a research office in Singapore, B&I Capital AG was founded in 2007 by Christian Bernasconi and Charles Isaac to give qualified investors a means to invest in Asian listed Real Estate, predominantly the nascent Asian REIT market. At that time REITs were an emerging asset class in developed equity markets such as Japan, Singapore and Hong Kong, and a more mature REIT market in Australia. B&I Capital is well regarded as an active investor that engages with the managements of the companies it invests in to encourage best practice and is also an active member of APREA which promotes the development of the listed Asian Real Estate sector. Currently B&I Capital employs 15 people and manages USD >1bn worth of assets and is licensed both in Switzerland by FINMA and in Singapore as a CMS License holder by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS).

Tien Foo is the Provost’s Chair Professor at the Department of Real Estate, Business School. He was formerly the Director of the Institute of Real Estate and Urban Studies (IREUS) (2015-2022) and the Head of the Department of Real Estate (2020-2022) at the National University of Singapore (NUS). He was the past President of the Asian Real Estate Society (AsRES) (2019-2021) and has been a board member of AsRES (since 2000) and the Global Chinese Real Estate Congress (GCREC) (since 2008).

He is the Post-doctoral Honoree (2012) and the Fellow (2017) of the US-based Weimer School of Advanced Studies in Real Estate and Land Economics, the Homer Hoyt Institute.

Tien Foo co-authors the books: “Kiasunomics” and “Kiasunomics 2”, which are written on daily life stories of typical Singaporean families based on research works done using Singapore’s data, and the book: “Singapore’s Real Estate: 50 Years of Transformation.”

Tien Foo serves as a member of the Panel of Assessors of the Appeal Board (Land Acquisition), Ministry of Law, Singapore (since 2010), and a member of the Valuation Review Board (VRB), Ministry of Finance, Singapore (since 2019). He was a member of the Professional Development Committee of the Council for Estate Agencies (CEA), Ministry of National Development (2014-2018). He is the co‐founder and the principal investigator of the NUS‐REDAS Real Estate Sentiment Index (launched in 2010). He serves as the Honorary Advisor of the PropTech Association of Singapore (SPTA) (2018) and the Singapore Estate Agencies Association (SEEA) (2019-2021).

Tien Foo obtains his Doctor of Philosophy degree from the University of Cambridge, U.K., with the Cambridge Commonwealth Trust scholarship and the Overseas Research Students award. He also holds a Master of Philosophy (Dist.) degree in Land Economy from the University of Cambridge, U.K., and a Bachelor of Science degree with 1 st  Class Honors in Estate Management from the National University of Singapore.

Ben is the Head of Real Assets Research for Asia at MSCI. He is responsible for the firm’s thought leadership on Asia’s commercial real estate market trends and providing market commentary to clients across the region. Ben also oversees the research and development of global commercial real estate transaction pricing indices at MSCI.

Prior to MSCI, Ben worked at Real Capital Analytics and the Urban Redevelopment Authority of Singapore, with research experience spanning both the commercial and residential sectors. His expertise includes research and strategy, econometric modelling, product development, and real estate data management. He holds a BSc in economics from University College London and a Master’s in quantitative methods in the social sciences from Columbia University.

An Chen co-heads the AEW Asia Pacific Real Estate Securities Team and serves as Portfolio Manager with responsibility for the construction of the Asia Pacific component of AEW’s global property securities portfolios. She also serves as a member of the Global Securities Allocation Committee (GSAC) which assesses global allocation adjustments of the global property securities portfolios. She joined AEW in 2010 and is based in AEW’s Singapore office. An’s industry experience dates back to 2006 and includes roles at Prudential Asset Management in both Singapore and Hong Kong, where she served as a portfolio manager and equity analyst for Asia Pacific ex Japan Real Estate and an equity analyst for the utilities sector. She holds a Bachelor’s degree from King’s College in London and is a CFA® charter holder. Ms. Chen is fluent in Mandarin.