SOHO China chairman upbeat on company's future

From the Internet companies, SOHO3Q gained not only inspiration, but substantial contracts, too. In June 2015, Uber announced its cooperation with SOHO3Q as part of its plan to move all its offices into SOHO The Bund in Shanghai. In Beijing, currently the major renters at SOHO Wangjing are Internet start-ups.

SOHO3Q is a successful experiment, according to Pan Shiyi. But for the total transition strategy, the new project has to achieve good performance at a huge scale in the near future. SOHO China expects the income from SOHO3Q to surpass the traditional rental income by mid-2016. From 2016, SOHO3Q is planning to cooperate with other real estate developers across China, beyond expanding among all of its 11 self-owned properties in Beijing and Shanghai.

In August Moody's downgraded SOHO China's ratings to Ba2 from Ba1, and the ratings outlook is stable. Moody's expects SOHO China's transition into a build-to-hold business model will take longer-than-expected, said Stephanie Lau, a Moody's Assistant Vice President and Analyst. Standard & Poor's Ratings Services also said that it had lowered its long-term corporate credit rating on SOHO China Ltd，to 'BB' from 'BB+'.

According to SOHO China, its transition is backed up by its sound liquidity position and a low debt ratio. The company is holding more than 9.7 billion yuan currently, and its debt ratio is as low as 25 percent. That will help the company runs stably and safely, especially during the current devaluation of renminbi, according to Yan Yan, CFO of SOHO China.

"SOHO China is holding around 1.70 million square meters high quality portfolio of commercial properties in prime locations in Beijing and Shanghai," said Pan Shiyi. "If we sell them, SOHO China will unlikely have a chance to buy back the properties."

Land resources are scarcer in the biggest Chinese cities, which has slowed down the land market while driving the price up. According to statistics from Beijing Municipal Bureau of Land and Resources, the land transition fees have been 103.7 billion yuan until September 12. That shows a 33.8 percent decline on a year-on-year basis, but the value per floor has gone up by 10 percent.

This year more real estate companies are stepping into the field of co-working office space. One among them is Urwork, which provides short terms rent of open desks and independent offices, aiming to be the Wework in China. Urwork was established in March by Mao Daqing, the former executive vice president of real estate developer Vanke.

According to Pan Shiyi, SOHO3Q is different from Urwork and other players, as it doesn't play the role of incubator. Without any qualification requirements for renters, SOHO3Q's target market is far beyond startup companies. Pan Shiyi intends to attract investment funds, law and accounting firms to move in, contributing a more diverse working environment.

Du Han contributed to the story.