"It all started three years ago when Al Batha expressed interest to co-develop our second tower (in Mont’ Kiara, Kuala Lumpur)," said Bukit Kiara Group (BKG) managing director N.K. Tong at the signing of a joint venture company known as Al Batha Bukit Kiara Holdings Sdn Bhd (ABBKH) in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates, early this week.

"I told Sheikh Salem (Mohammed Al Qassimi, vice chairman of Al Batha) that he was better off as an investor in our apartment units than as a co-developer because our (development) profit margins are very reasonable – much less than what investors can make."

Surprisingly, Salem liked Tong’s ethical attitude to development as he saw making "reasonable profit" an honourable way to do business, much like how his 29-year-old Sharjah, UAEbased conglomerate with 20 autonomous companies involved in automobiles to pharmaceuticals and construction to real estate, has been run.

This shared core value led both groups to explore ways of working together, resulting in the formation of ABBKH, with the Middle Eastern company paying RM42 million for its 40 per cent equity stake.

Al Batha’s group managing director, German-born Rainer Joechen, said he sees the relationship as "having found a partner whom we share the same values and with whom we want to advance together with".

"It is an important step for us into the global market … to invest in Malaysia is in line with (our) strategic objective," he said.

The privately owned Al Batha is no stranger to local shores as it formed a project joint-venture with another developer, Glomac Bhd, one-and-a-half years ago to develop a 40-storey Grade A office tower near the Kuala Lumpur City Centre.

It sold the project in late 2007 for RM576.85 million to Kuwait Finance House Bhd and real estate investor Prestige Scale Sdn Bhd, or RM1,120psf, allowing it to recognise "reasonable profit".

Via Glomac Al Batha Mutiara Sdn Bhd, both companies are now jointly working on another office tower on a 2.66-acre freehold site in Mutiara Damansara in Petaling Jaya, Selangor, purchased in July this year for RM38.69 million or RM334psf.

Unlike its dealings with Glomac, however, Joechen said Al Batha’s involvement with BKG is "not on a project basis but on a long term scale".

Three developments will come under the wings of the newly formed ABBKH: Part of the four-tower Verve Suites Mont’ Kiara that will house a total of 1,000 serviced apartments; the proposed 190- unit Verve Suites KLCC along Jalan Tun Razak; and an upand- coming 24-unit lowrise luxury apartment block that may be called Ambangan along Jalan Madge, also in KL.

ABBKH is expected to enjoy 82 per cent of the three projects’ gross development value of RM855 million over the next three to seven years. With Al Batha’s 40 per cent equity, it would stand to derive at least RM280 million over this period.

Al Batha group finance director Ishak Noor said the company will bring more to the table than just its financial contribution, as it has "international exposure" and "an energy contracting company" that can provide considerable technical know-how in this age of green sustainability.

ABBKH will also set up a property sales centre in Dubai that can offer "alternative real estate to investors looking to buy" as well as act as a Malaysia My Second Home information outlet.