Here East announces Gavin Du Preez as newly appointed Estates Director

• Here East announces series of moves within its senior team
• This new appointment comes after a year of solid growth for the east London tech and innovation campus

Here East, the innovation and technology campus, has today announced Gavin Du Preez has been appointed as Estate Director.

Having previously held the Operations Director role at the campus, Gavin brings a wealth of experience to his role as an experienced facilities and real estate manager. He will be replacing Sara Carthy, who will be moving to take on a position within Savills, Here East’s appointed property and facilities management company.

The appointment comes after a year of strong commercial growth for the campus, despite the challenges posed by the pandemic.

Located in Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, Delancey’s Here East is a 1.2 million sq ft tech and innovation campus. A catalyst for growth, it is home to over 4,500 academics and innovators and, is designed to foster collaboration, allowing its community to collaborate, scale and grow at pace. Tenants include Plexal (Here East’s innovation centre), BT Sport, Ford Smart Mobility, Studio Wayne McGregor, Matchesfashion, UCL Bartlett School of Architecture and Loughborough University London. It is also the site of the upcoming V&A Research and Collection Centre.

Before joining Here East in 2018, Gavin worked at Chiswick Park and at White City Place as Head of Operations and Engineering. At White City Place, Gavin mobilised the 1.8million sq ft scheme for owners Stanhope, Mitsui Fudosan and Aimco. Joining Here East as Operations Director, Gavin worked on and ultimately won the inaugural RICS Social Impact awards and has built a committed and dedicated team at Here East.

Gavin will be taking on the role from Sara Carthy, who will be taking on a new position within Savills as Strategy and Performance Lead to further develop the Savills RISE strategy across the prime office and mixed-use sectors. Sara will focus on developing talent and a customer-centric culture to support best in class and consistent service for their clients and customers.

Sara was headhunted to join Here East in 2015, joining at the construction phase when the mobilisation team was being established. Before joining Here East, Sara was part of the award-winning senior leadership team that set up Liverpool ONE and previously worked across the retail and educational spaces.

Finally, Ciaran O’Neill will move into the Operations Director role, bringing over 14 years’ experience in commercial and residential property management. Before joining Here East in 2015, Ciaran worked at Paddington Central, managing two large multi-tenants building exceeding 400,000 sq. ft. Ciaran initially joined Here East as Property Manager before moving into a dedicated Project & Fitout role in 2018, leading on several large-scale projects, most notably the V&A Research and Collection Centre work.

Gavin Du Preez, Estate Director, Here East comments: “I am delighted to begin this new role at Here East and collaborating with the leadership team to continue to build one of the fastest-growing clusters of tech and creative business in London. As more companies return to the campus, it is an exciting time for Here East, and I am looking forward to working with all of our existing and future tenants to ensure the ecosystem of community members continues to grow.”

Mike Magan, Chief Operating Officer, Here East said: “Gavin has excelled in his position as Operations Director and has already had a hugely positive impact at Here East, so we are proud to announce his promotion to Estate Director. This promotion highlights how despite the hurdles the pandemic has created, our community at Here East has continued to grow and flourish.

“Gavin’s promotion is an acknowledgement of his enormous contribution over the last eighteen months, and we know his transition into his new role will be seamless and key to the continued commercial success of Here East”.