CBRE president Brett White tells GlobeSt.com the IPO was a "non-event inside the company. It's good to be public. We feel we have a lot to offer investors." He said the company remains "very comfortable with its capital structure. The proof is in the data."
Regarding the merger of CBRE and Insignia/ESG, White says, "We'll look back at it as a case study in how to do it right." He was surprised "how well the local offices came together. It was a really painless integration. We had expected to work harder at getting the offices to culturally and physically merge." White says a factor in helping that integration was dispelling fears on the local level. "There was very little uncertainty." He says the company was able to retain customers and employees as well as realize some expense reductions.
He notes that one of the lessons he's learned during this process deals with those local offices. "At the end of the day, business is about field-level quality. It's a bit humbling." While not getting into specifics, he says he expects to see continued growth as the economy improves.
One industry trend White sees is the continued bifurcation of the marketplace which is currently populated by a number of highly focused niche players, the larger full-service firms and those somewhere in between. "Our stiffest competition are the local boutiques," he says, adding that the company is "constantly approached" by those in the middle ground.
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