LONDON-Mickola Wilson has left the struggling Marylebone Warwick Balfour to join Teesland as Joint Chief Executive alongside Paul Oliver. The two were formerly colleagues at Guardian Royal Exchange.

LONDON-Marks & Spencer is to roll out its new Simply Food format in Northern Ireland with a requirement for ten new stores in the province. The high street food format has already proved successful in London and the South east of England and M&S expects to open 150 of the stores over the next three years.

LONDON-Italian kitchen company Baumatic has taken a 50,000-sf distribution unit at the Omega distribution scheme in Didcot, Oxfordshire, developed by Albion Land and the Diageo Pension Scheme.

LONDON-Industrial property specialist Ashtenne has sold the Sittingbourne research park in north Kent for pounds 19.75 million ($30 million). The company only bought the property 15 months ago for pounds 11.3 million ($17.6 million).

LONDON-The largest shopping centres in the UK--those over 500,000 sf--have fallen out of favour with retailers, according to new research from Donaldsons. Rents in the largest shopping centres only grew by 1.5% in the year to June 2002, against 2.7% across all shopping centres and 5.7% for high street shops.

LONDON-BL Gazeley, the joint venture between British Land and Wal-Mart's property arm Gazeley Properties, has agreed five major deals in the last two months. In Thatcham, Berkshire, it has sold a 355,000-sf distribution unit for Pounds 38.5 million ($60 million)

LONDON-The UK's house price spiral shows no sign of running out of steam according to the latest RICS survey, with an on-going shortage of homes for sale driving the market.

LONDON-Benchmark is to demonstrate its confidence in the troubled West End office market with two speculative starts in the coming months. Schemes in Golden Square, Soho and Savile Row, Mayfair, will provide almost 100,000 sf of new space.