Latest news with #Newstead
News.com.au
3 days ago
- Business
- News.com.au
New apartment tower bound for $64m Brisbane site as housing crisis worsens
A major developer has paid $64.5m for a Brisbane riverfront site with plans to build more than 200 apartments at a time when the nation's fastest-growing city is crying out for more housing. It comes as new figures show construction timeframes have ballooned by 58 per cent in Queensland, and the state is still about 100,000 homes short of meeting its share of the 1.2 million national target by 2029. Consolidated Properties Group (CPG) has bought the 9,368 sqm site, featuring 47m of direct river frontage, at 47 Skyring Terrace, Newstead, in an off-market deal from Mirvac Group. Zac Efron's Aussie long lunch haunt is on the market Zoned for mixed use, the site has potential for up to 42,000 sqm of floor space and a maximum building height of 25 storeys under the Brisbane City Plan. While many private developers are struggling to find a builder to take on their projects, CPG has managed to sign Hutchinson Builders to deliver the apartments. CPG CEO and Chairman Don O'Rorke said the Newstead site offered a rare opportunity to deliver a 'super-premium' luxury residential apartment building in a prime inner-city location. 'Sites like this are as rare as it gets,' Mr O'Rorke said. 'We thought Monarch might be a one-off, but at Newstead we've been fortunate to have the opportunity to create another iconic residential address right in the heart of the city on the Brisbane River. This will be something elevated in every sense — something truly special.' It comes as the federal government's National Housing Accord prepares to mark its first-year anniversary, with the latest ABS figures showing Queensland has only approved 34,301 homes in the past 11 months. Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) analysis of recent ABS data shows, on average, between 2014 and 2024, the time to build a home in Queensland increased from six months in 2014 to more than 10 months in 2024 — a 58 per cent jump, with housing construction material costs also rising by 58 per cent. Brisbane architect Nick Symonds, Director of MAS Architecture Studio, said the demand for high-density housing was high, but the delivery pipeline was struggling to keep pace. 'These aren't townhouses or boutique builds,' Mr Symonds said. 'We're talking about substantial residential projects with hundreds of apartments, and developers can't find a builder willing or able to take them on under current conditions. 'Tier-one contractors have stepped away from major residential developments — not because they lack interest, but because these projects take too long, carry too much risk, and no longer stack up commercially compared to government work.' Mr Symonds said Olympic-related infrastructure and major public works were absorbing much of the available construction workforce. 'The Olympics is creating thousands of jobs, which is great, but it's pulling trades away from residential construction at the worst possible time,' he said. CPG plans to lodge a development application later this year with award-winning architects, Woods Bagot, who are already working on concept plans. CPG head of residential James MacGinley said the development would include a mix of boutique riverfront villas and 2-and 3-bedroom apartments, with north-east views up the river towards Hamilton Hill. 'It is peerless and there is no better development site in Brisbane,' Mr MacGinley said. 'We plan to do it justice and deliver a signature building for the city.' Colliers Queensland residential director Brendan Hogan, who negotiated the offmarket purchase with Troy Linnane, said demand for prestige development opportunities in Brisbane was outpacing supply. 'Opportunities like this simply don't come up anymore. This is the last of its kind on the Newstead waterfront and arguably the best-located residential site in the city,' Mr Hogan said. 'We're seeing exceptional demand in the premium apartment market, with 'off-the-plan' riverfront apartments achieving prices over $35,000 per square metre of net saleable area. 'The surge in apartment prices is largely driven by the demand from owner-occupiers who are seeking premium and larger apartment stock, which has accounted for the majority of sales in the market over the past two years.' The site acquisition reflects broader supply-side pressure in Brisbane's residential pipeline. Population forecasts show Brisbane will grow by more than 500,000 people during the next decade — faster than both Sydney and Melbourne — and inner-Brisbane is expected to face a shortfall of over 14,000 new apartments in the next four years alone, according to SQM Research. 'We know Brisbane is the nation's fastest-growing city with unlimited potential and we're building for that future,' Mr O'Rorke said.
Yahoo
14-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Meta Goes on Trial for Instagram Acquisition: ‘They Decided That Competition Was Too Hard'
In an antitrust trial that has been years in the making, Meta headed to court on Monday to face the Federal Trade Commission's accusations it illegally built a social media monopoly by acquiring Instagram and WhatsApp more than a decade ago. The trial, held in the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia, poses a significant threat to the $1.37 trillion tech juggernaut CEO Mark Zuckerberg has built. Zuckerberg, who founded Facebook in 2004, has created a social media empire that has stamped out competitors and violated antitrust law, the FTC has argued, due to its $1 billion purchase of Instagram in 2012 and its $19 billion acquisition of WhatsApp in 2014. 'Since at least 2012, Meta has enjoyed monopoly power in that market,' the FTC said in a court filing last year. 'The Commission further contends that Defendant unlawfully maintained that monopoly by acquiring two actual or nascent competitors, Instagram and WhatsApp, that posed a threat to its dominance at the time.' Meta, which was still called Facebook when it went public in 2012, has seen its share price skyrocket more than 1,300% in the 13 years since its Wall Street debut. The company reported it had 3.35 billion people who use at least one of the apps within its 'family,' as Meta calls it, during the fourth quarter of 2024. That massive user base has helped make Meta into an advertising giant, with the company reporting $164.50 billion in sales last year — with about 96% of that stemming from its ad business. That success has come as Meta has squashed any ability for real competitors to emerge in the social media space, according to the FTC. 'For more than 100 years, American public policy has insisted firms must compete if they want to succeed,' Daniel Matheson, the FTC's lead litigator, said in his opening remarks on Monday, per The New York Times. 'The reason we are here is that Meta broke the deal.' Matheson added: 'They decided that competition was too hard and it would be easier to buy out their rivals than to compete with them.' His comments, made inside a jammed courtroom, occurred after quite a long road to get to this point; the FTC has been building its case since December 2020, first launching during the final days of President Trump's first term in office. Meta has fought back against the FTC's antitrust claims, which the company said are 'weak' in a blog post from Jennifer Newstead, its chief legal officer, on Sunday. Newstead argued that the FTC's lawsuit is bogus because it conveniently ignores how Meta faces stiff competition for users' time from platforms like YouTube and TikTok. 'In order for the FTC to win this case, they need to prove both that Meta has a dominant share in a properly defined product market that includes all competitors, and that the two acquisitions harmed competition and consumers. They are wrong on both claims,' she wrote. Newstead continued: 'That's why they've gerrymandered a fictitious market in which Facebook and Instagram compete only with Snapchat and an app called MeWe. In reality, more time is spent on TikTok and YouTube than on either Facebook or Instagram – if you only add TikTok and YouTube into the FTC's social media market definition, Meta has [less than] 30% market share.' The Wall Street Journal reported earlier this month that Zuckerberg had been cozying up to President Trump in an effort to get the FTC case settled before trial. Zuckerberg was also prominently featured at the president's inauguration in January, alongside a who's who of other tech execs. That push for a settlement obviously did not materialize, and Zuckerberg is now expected to be called as the first witness in the trial. What he has to say — as well as other prominent executives like Instagram co-founder Kevin Systrom — will be worth paying close attention to in the days and weeks post Meta Goes on Trial for Instagram Acquisition: 'They Decided That Competition Was Too Hard' appeared first on TheWrap.
