Gramercy Capital Corp., a New York-based commercial real estate company, has changed both its investment strategy and its management following completion of a strategic review. In addition, the company’s board has elected to keep the company as an independent entity.
Going forward, Gramercy will focus on investing in single-tenant net-leased properties across a wide variety of industries in markets with strong demographics. These will be funded from existing financial resources for now, but in the future, the company expects to seek to raise additional debt and/or equity capital to support further growth.
To implement this strategy, Gramercy has hired Gordon F. DuGan as its new chief executive. He is the former CEO of W.P. Carey & Co. LLC. In addition, two other former W.P. Carey executives are taking management positions at Gramercy: Benjamin P. Harris as president and Nicholas L. Pell as managing director.
Current CEO Roger M. Cozzi will step down on June 30, while current president Timothy J. O’Connor leaves on July 31, but will remain as a consultant through October. (In the interim, Harris will be chief investment officer.)
DuGan during his first 60 days will lead an operational review of the company's existing assets and operations with the goal of reducing the current cost structure, further strengthening the balance sheet and determining which legacy assets and operations complement the new investment strategy.
Gramercy expects to provide an update on its implementation of the investment strategy and operational review in connection with its second-quarter 2012 financial results and expects to further communicate the new strategy through an investor presentation to be posted its website no later than Sept. 30.
