High Concept by Trivest 2007-8 Away Sponsorship and Chalmers St Building Refurbishment

1st March 2007

South Sydney Rabbitohs and specialist property developer Trivest have formed a joint venture, High Concept, to purchase and re-develop South Sydney Leagues Club at 265 Chalmers St, Redfern, in a $35 million deal. The joint venture will see the construction of a purpose-built Leagues Club with a $3 million fit out, the construction of a new Football Club headquarters and 10,000 square metres of commercial space, to be leased.

As part of the re-development, the joint development vehicle "High Concept by Trivest" will become the Football Club's Away sponsor over the next year, with further sponsorship commitment in place for the following two years, providing the club with close to $2 million worth of sponsorship funds.

Souths' playing strip is now worth $2.8million after their own redevelopment joint venture, High Concept, joined as a jersey backer yesterday.

The Football Club will also benefit from the rental payments to be generated by the leasing of the commercial space and funds generated by the newly refurbished building. The new building will also incorporate the South Sydney Football Club offices and player facilities, a Rabbitohs Hall of Fame, along with the commercial and retail space. Trivest is one of Australia's most successful private property groups, specialising in the re-development of heritage buildings on Sydney's city fringe. The company's property portfolio under development is worth more than $200 million and some of the successful developments it has undertaken include the Reader's Digest building in Surry Hills, the Festival Records Building in Pyrmont and the former Co-op Bookshop headquarters at Bay St, Ultimo.

The entire deal between Souths and property developer Trivest was valued at $35 million and involves developing space at Souths Leagues Club that has been dormant for 12 years.

Rabbitohs' Executive Chairman Peter Holmes à Court said: "The establishment of the joint venture underpins the financial future of the Football and Leagues clubs, while creating an exciting new community, recreation and commercial facility in the heart of Rabbitohs' territory. "We expect the re-development of the Club and the creation of our new headquarters will be completed at the same time as the refurbishment of Redfern Park in 2008 to include the Rabbitohs' new training headquarters, fulfilling another goal Russell Crowe and myself set ourselves when we won control of the Football Club last year," he added.

Yesterday was significant for the Rabbitohs as Peter Holmes a Court and Russell Crowe officially took over the leagues club, taking it out of administration, with $10-15 million worth of refurbishments to be carried out. "We've only used 15 per cent of this building," Souths chief executive Shane Richardson said. "We intend to use one hundred per cent."

Co-founder and a director of Trivest, Mr Albert Bertini, said: "We will bring to the project of re-building the Leagues Club and Football headquarters all of the expertise we have built up over the last 10 years in the redevelopment of challenging and heritage buildings on the city fringe. "We believe in the vision and skills of the owners and management at the Rabbitohs and are very proud to feature our name on the team's away jerseys, as well as on their sleeves in the home games. This level of involvement reflects our commitment to the club and the local community. Also we plan for High Concept to successfully re-build other older buildings around Redfern. Trivest will also continue to develop our own projects," concluded Mr Bertini. Developer Albert Bertini said the leagues club would change so dramatically that surrounding land prices would probably rise.

Chris Green from DSEG, a consulting business that has delivered and overseen successful growth strategies for many of the biggest brands in Australian sport, said: "This deal is certainly one of the biggest sponsorship deals in Rugby League and the combination of Souths' three major partners means they are now in the top five teams in the country for revenue generated from their jersey." The design of the building is being done by leading architects, Kann Finch

High Concept by Trivest, joint venture between Trivest and the South Sydney Rabbitohs will provide a new Leagues club with a modern $3m fitout and the construction of a new football club headquarters. Members will being enjoying the new facilities in 2008.

Retailers downstairs, a hall of fame, a gym on level two and other aspects of the overhaul would be complete in two years.

Trivest Submits Plans for Council Approval

23rd May 2007

High Concept, the joint venture of the South Sydney Football Club and specialist property group Trivest, has submitted a Development Application to the City of Sydney for the re-development of the former South Sydney Leagues Club building at 265 Chalmers Street, Redfern. The former club building and car park, covering 12,000 square metres, was purchased by the Football Club in February 2007, and a new company called High Concept Commercial was formed to redevelop the building in partnership with Albert Bertini's Trivest group.

Trivest specialises in adaptive re-use of city fringe commercial buildings and has been very successful in the development of buildings in Alexandria, Pyrmont, Surry Hills and Ultimo.

South Sydney Leagues Club will retain ownership of 1,500 square metres on the first floor, by strata title, in the new Rabbitohs building, with brand new licensed club premises. Leading architects Kann Finch, have been engaged to draw up High Concept?s designs for the Rabbitohs building, which have now been submitted for approval.

The Football Club will have new management and player facilities in the building, which will be finished to coincide with the completion in 2008 of the new South Sydney Rabbitohs? training facility at Redfern Park, currently being built by the City of Sydney. High Concept is currently in negotiations with other prospective tenants for the remaining 10,000 square metres in the building, which include a small, express style supermarket, a small public gymnasium and commercial offices.

High-Concept by Trivest 265 Chalmers St Building Refurbishment Plans

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