Destination Hyderabad: The Inaugural CRE Symposium n January 2014, the servicing heads of Berkadia and Wells Fargo met at an annual conference to catch up and discuss the current state of the commercial real estate (CRE) industry. The conversation eventually turned to something else that they had in common: their captive offshore servicing platforms in Hyderabad, India. Berkadia established its platform in 2002 and Wells Fargo expanded an existing platform to include CRE servicing support in 2006. Mark McCool, President of Berkadia Commercial Real Estate Services, and Alan Kronovet, Executive Vice President and Head of Wells Fargo Commercial Mortgage Servicing, discussed the continued expansion of their platforms and both companies’ commitment to quality, training and employee development, agreeing that education was a fundamental component of their success. For both companies, the commitment to education yielded substantially higher annual education hours per employee compared to the industry benchmark, as established by the rating agencies. They further agreed that their employees were ambitious with an eye towards accretive knowledge and advancement. Importantly, they also recognized the one component of training that their teams in India were largely missing: direct and personal access to current market and business trends that impact the CRE sector. Domestic based servicing and production operations are afforded myriad opportunities to obtain information, whether it is via regional or annual conferences dedicated to industry specific subject matters or larger events bringing together representatives from across the U.S. CRE sector. Conversely, offshore operations or third party providers do not have the same access to information, current events and subject matter experts. For example, both Wells Fargo’s and Berkadia’s servicing operations in Hyderabad rely on the dissemination of industry data and market trends through town hall meetings conducted during visits from senior U.S. based managers, video conferencing and MBA training courses that are available on-line. Although valuable information is shared, these meetings do not provide the same experience of hearing and networking with industry leading subject matter experts face-to-face. Genesis of a Symposium The opportunity to recognize the impact India has had on CRE business operations and the ability to provide a training venue for so many professionals led to the conclusion that a conference should be conducted in India. After discussing with their respective servicing platforms, the concept of organizing a Commercial Real CRE Finance World Winter 2015 36 Estate Symposium in Hyderabad was born, which would be a forum for employees at all levels to learn about CRE trends from top industry leaders. Jan Sternin, Senior Vice President of Berkadia and Dan Bober, Executive Vice President of Wells Fargo were tasked with establishing and leading the venue, defining the events, logistics, conference attendees and everything else that would be needed to ensure a successful execution. Wells Fargo and Berkadia did their part financially too, by agreeing to co-sponsor the Symposium. To appeal to a broad audience, highly respected and well known speakers were needed. In order to attract that type of talent, it was necessary to create an event that would be recognized industry-wide and one that could ultimately be added to the global CRE conference calendar. Fortunately, Hyderabad has become a financial services center supporting the CRE industry amongst other sectors, which gave instant credibility to the Symposium and helped it gain the recognition and momentum needed. An industry inclusive invitation list was developed and familiar companies that owned offshore operations or were third party service providers that supported U.S. CRE efforts accepted the invitations, including: Blackrock, Cognizant, Accenture, Silverskills, MCube, Genpact and Standard & Poors (S&P). The programming efforts began with creating a thoughtful agenda that would cover all aspects of the current CRE landscape, such as the servicing and origination sectors, a broader U.S. economic and market overview, a detailed look at underwriting and servicing trends, career management, legislative and regulatory issues and, of course, the future of outsourcing. With a number of topics to cover and in anticipation of a large number of attendees, the decision was made to create a one day program that would be replicated on the second day in order to offer the Symposium to twice as many professionals. Making the Concept a Reality Event planning began in earnest in February 2014, when both Fitch Ratings and S&P committed to visiting Berkadia’s and Wells Fargo’s Hyderabad operations. They were not the first agencies to do so, but their timing gave both Berkadia and Wells Fargo an opportunity to identify and present a venue that could support what would be approximately 450 attendees per day for the Symposium. Ultimately, the new and impressive Trident Hotel in Hyderabad was chosen because it was large enough to support the attendees and could provide accommodations for the panelists and out-of-town guests. I Jan Sternin Senior Vice President and Managing Director Berkadia
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