UK real estate adviser Bidwells is rolling out a £1.2B investment management platform that will oversee close to 20M SF of assets, formalising a part of the business it has effectively been running for decades.

The firm has managed capital on behalf of endowments, most notably University of Cambridge colleges, for more than a century. That heritage has typically centred on land, science and technology parks, and income-producing real estate.

The new Bidwells Investment Management platform is intended to bring that experience into a more defined, client-facing structure. The business describes it as offering “a more hands-on investment advisory service,” with a focus on bespoke mandates and joint ventures rather than pooled fund strategies, the company said. It will lean heavily on Bidwells’ presence in sectors such as life sciences, the Oxford-Cambridge growth corridor and complex land-backed opportunities.

To grow, the platform is targeting private wealth and family offices, UK and international capital, institutions seeking specialist exposure to UK subsectors and long-term landowners looking to professionalise how portfolios are structured and managed.

Its first deal under the new banner has seen BIM support Trinity College Cambridge on the acquisition of 2-8 Eastcheap, a 62K SF mixed-use building in the City of London, through a joint venture with Greycoat. The team advised on investment strategy and helped structure and deliver the transaction, including setting up the joint venture itself.

It has also been involved in the repositioning and subsequent sale of Trinity’s leasehold interest in the O2 Centre in London, an asset Bidwells originally acquired for Trinity in 2009, where it executed a lease restructuring strategy to shift the scheme towards a long-income profile.

“BIM has been launched in response to a clear shift in how real estate investment needs to be managed," Bidwells partner and Head of Investment Management at BIM Robert Leadbetter said in a statement.

“The way people use real estate is evolving fast. Understanding this change is essential to delivering return outperformance. Real estate investors today are participating in a fragmented market where traditional uses of property are being disrupted, and where the importance of previously alternative real estate sectors continues to grow.”