Our story begins here in 1994, along with important events for the country, such as the creation of the Real Plan, which controlled hyperinflation, and as expected, football also left its mark in that important year, with the conquest of the fourth championship for the Brazilian team, in the USA World Cup.
In retrospect, these three decades show us the evolution of Brazil in several aspects, we grew in population, from almost 160 million to more than 212 million in 2024; in terms of education, the illiteracy rate fell from 20% to 7%; and especially we saw a significant change in the occupation of urban spaces – 84% of the Brazilian population today lives in urban areas. The verticalization of the main centers has, therefore, been a constant during this period and Cushman & Wakefield has, since its arrival in Brazil, helped hundreds of tenants and owners to make the best decisions about real estate occupation and to raise the level of these spaces .
In the year the company was founded, Avenida Paulista was still the main commercial and financial center of São Paulo, the city chosen to be the company's headquarters in the country and in South America. Since the beginning of its operations, still under the name Cushman & Wakefield Semco, the company was already gaining customers in this city postcard. One of the most classic of them, the Eluma Building (built in 1977), has remained faithful to our Property Management service since 1997.
In the year following the start of Cushman & Wakefield in Brazil, the now famous Avenida Brigadeiro Faria Lima began to take on a different form with Operação Urbana Faria Lima, as a project by the city hall at the time (1995). Nova Faria Lima only existed on paper at that time.
With its consolidation in São Paulo, in 1999 Cushman & Wakefield began operating in other markets in the country, and opened its office in the city of Rio de Janeiro. There it also gains loyal customers, such as Edifício Internacional Rio, a Property Management client since then.
From the wonderful city, it heads to other strategic regions of the country, where it opens operational offices in the South and Northeast.
The beginning of the new millennium brought trends that changed the occupation of high-end offices in Brazil. There was a latent need for larger offices that could accommodate the headquarters of multinationals and large companies.
And in 2004, the Faria Lima Consortium Urban Operation was approved, which revoked the previous law and attracted investments for the region's infrastructure, giving rise to the avenue as we know it today (Nova Faria Lima).
The plans of the buildings in this region were designed to be larger than those of the buildings in Paulista and the raised floors supported the installation of electrical and electronic infrastructures, in addition to having adequate ceiling heights for the installation of air conditioning. These characteristics allowed large corporations to set up shop in the region, often on a single floor.
All these investments made Avenida Faria Lima the new financial center of São Paulo and the location continues to be one of the most coveted in the city by large corporations, especially in the financial sector and big techs.
In the following decade, due to the scarcity of land in Berrini, it was the turn of the growth of Avenida Chucri Zaidan, which was driven by the beginning of the Parque da Cidade Project in 2010. New and modern buildings appeared in the region that enabled important flight-to-air movements. quality for the occupants.
We reached 2020 and an unprecedented challenge brought uncertainty to our market. The COVID-19 pandemic has suddenly changed the routine of working in offices. The whole world was forced to work remotely and this raised a lot of doubt about the future of the office as we knew it until then. Since then, Cushman & Wakefield has been a protagonist in this scenario, providing its clients with important insights into real estate occupation. That year, we launched the Six Feet Office model, which brought safe occupancy measures to workplaces, in addition to guiding its clients about the importance that physical space would have in returning to work post-pandemic.
As predicted by Cushman & Wakefield, workspaces have not lost their importance, on the contrary, today, in 2024, they are gaining more and more relevance for the formation of corporate culture and innovation. The reformulation of the workplace towards increasingly welcoming and shared environments is a reality.
Always attentive to trends, Cushman & Wakefield was responsible for carrying out important transactions in the main commercial regions for its clients, in addition to providing specialized services for the most diverse sectors, with very high degrees of complexity. Emblematic negotiations, which helped shape the main regions of large centers, were and continue to be conducted with the expertise of our professionals.
In 30 years, we have generated impact for Brazil with the consolidation of cutting-edge commercial real estate services, which have positively influenced occupancy and raised the level of management services in the sector.
We are proud of our past and see the future with optimism, holding firm to our belief: Dare to go further. And that's why we don't conform to the world that was built, but we dare to go further to push it towards better times.
