Dr. Kıvanç Erman, mrics has founded Mergen Consulting, the only commercial real estate consulting firm in Turkey, after 21 years of total experience, 15 being in investment banking and 6 in Commercial Real Estate, with the aim of building the bridge between finance and real estate. His unique combination of experience in finance, real estate and agency is the driving motive of this motto.

Dr. Erman was responsible for supervision of both advisory and capital markets activities at Jones Lang LaSalle Turkey. Other than preparing extensive market reports periodically, his team worked in close contact with Pan Euro Capital Markets teams, Valuation team and Strategic Consulting teams based in other Jones Lang LaSalle offices worldwide to providing international clientele full range of services. Since his start in Jones Lang LaSalle, his team advised many international and local developers/investors for feasibility of development projects and prepared highest and best use reports to assist the investors for the optimal development. The team also publishes publicly available market researches and quantitative studies to increase the quality of research in the market. With his capital markets role, he was involved in a number of potential transactions advising on the buyer side all of which involved global investment funds and/or sovereign wealth funds. His team completed one of the largest land sales in İstanbul in cash at $ 105 million, namely the Netaş Land in Umraniye; and the buy side advisory for the acquisition of a retail portfolio in various cities of Turkey on behalf of Blackstone private equity fund. The platform now operates under the name of Qubicon.

Kıvanç has more than 15 years of experience in investment banking sector, especially on capital market activities. Prior to joining Jones Lang LaSalle, Kıvanç has been managing the international securities funds in Yapı Kredi Asset Management, the biggest asset management firm in Turkey in terms of AUM at the time. Aside from being a Senior Pension Fund Manager, he was also the head of the Quantitative Analysis & Research workgroup, aiming to determine the internal dynamics of the Turkish markets for asset allocation purposes. Before YKAM, Kivanç worked in Strateji Securities, a boutique securities firm, as Head of International Capital Markets, successfully carrying out relations with international institutional investors, dealing, organizing the research flow and several public offerings.

Kıvanç holds a Ph.D. degree in Finance, M.A. in Capital Markets and B.A. in Political & Administrative Sciences, all in Marmara University, Istanbul. Between 2007 – 2012, he lectured “Investment Analysis & Portfolio Management” courses to MBA classes at Bahçeşehir University, Istanbul. Kıvanç is a member of European Research Group (ERG), the respected research arm of the International Council of Shopping Centres and he is also one of the assessors of the RICS in Turkey. Kıvanç is fluent in Turkish, English, French and Spanish.

  Dr. Kıvanç Erman CV

Nilgün Erman has carried her more than 20 years of experience in retail and shopping centres into Mergen Consulting Group at the beginning of 2014, enabling the company to grow on retail and leasing sectors. Nilgün is responsible from all retail and shopping centre operations as the CEO of  MCG.

Nilgün Erman, has started her carrier in Akmerkez and continued as Leasing Manager in Bayraktar Real Estate Developments and General Coordinator in Alkaş Consulting.  Following the acquisition of Alkaş Consulting in 2008 by Jones Lang LaSalle, she acted as the Retail Director and the Management Board Member in Turkey office.  She has acted as Member of Executive Board responsible from entire retail & shopping centre operations as well as the general management of the Company until April 2014, when she resigned as the Managing Director (MD) of JLL Turkey. She has been involved actively in all the JLL projects, especially in all the concept development phase, and actively managed the leasing team. Considering her role as General Coordinator in Alkas Consulting, acquired by JLL, she has actively managed the concept development and leasing services in more than 50 projects, not only in Istanbul but also in Anatolia and in peripheral countries.

Amongst the well-known projects where Nilgün has actively been involved in concept development & leasing; İstinyePark, Zorlu Center, ViaPort, Rönesans Optimum & Piazza concepts, Emaar Square, Forum Marmara, KentPark, Armada and Panora shopping centres can be stated. She has also been involved in 3 shopping centres in Northern Iraq (Erbil, Süleymaniye & Dohuk) and Emaar Square in Syria and led her teams in concept development and leasing. She has also established the JLL Street Leasing team, to create different solutions for retailers, given her perfect relations with them.

In addition to her retail expertise, during her post as the Managing Director in JLL Turkey, she has also been actively involved in establishment, improvement and managing of the office leasing team.

Nilgün Erman is a member of International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC) and KAGIDER (Women Entrepreneurs’ Association) and is fluent in English.

Neşe Ünlü, has joined Mergen Consulting Group as a Project Manager at the beginning of 2014 and has contributed actively to the growth of the company in concept development and leasing. She is actively involved in Mergen Consulting Group’s retail services with almost 10 years of experience in the sector.

Neşe Ünlü has started her carrier in Alkaş Consulting and continued in Jones Lang LaSalle as a Leasing Manager, with the acquisition of this company in 2008. Until April 2014 she has left JLL, she has been actively involved in operational responsibilities such as shop mix preparation, planning and budgeting of all retail areas, realization of leasing presentations, leasing negotiations, leasing deal closing and regular reporting in Shopping Centre projects.

Neşe has been involved in 15 projects in her carrier,in and out of Istanbul,  including but not limited to Rönesans Optimum Göztepe, SankoPark, MalatyaPark, Kozzy, AquaFlorya AVM, Vialand, Zorlu and Özdilek Center, and has actively been responsible for shop mix & leasing negotiations.

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