Regional Advocacy Committee

Jeremy Ong is a partner in Baker McKenzie's Hong Kong office and he leads the REITs practice in Hong Kong. He has over 15 years of experience advising REITs on their formation, acquisitions, disposals, equity/debt capital raising exercises and liability management exercises, and advised on almost all of Hong Kong's largest REIT transactions.

Jeremy has been recognised by Legal 500 as a "Next Generation Partner" in two key areas for REITs (investment funds; real estate) and his practice is also described by Chambers as “a trusted adviser to REITs” which is “often instructed to assist clients with IPOs and capital raisings”. 

Shagoofa has over two decades of experience in private equity, acquisitions, joint ventures and strategic initiatives, corporate and commercial laws, compliance and ethics advisory, audit and finance roles. In her career span of over 23 years, she was an in-house counsel for 10 years with leading Indian corporate houses. She has also played an active role on the policy advocacy front by being part of committees constituted by the regulators, providing support to industry associations and assisting clients on representations to Government ministries and regulatory bodies.

Prior to joining NIIF, Shagoofa was a Partner with Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas (CAM). At CAM, she headed the Investments Funds practice and specialised in Private Equity investment advisory for infrastructure, real estate, and financial services sectors. She has advised global and domestic fund houses in structuring and setting up of their cross border as well as domestic funds, including combination structures and fund of funds. 

Prior to joining CAM, Shagoofa was the Senior Director and Head Legal and Compliance at IDFC Alternatives. Prior to IDFC, she was Vice President in the Group Legal Team of Tata Sons. Before Tata, she was with Kotak Investment Advisors Limited (KIAL) as Senior Vice President and Head Legal. Prior to Kotak, she was head - real estate funds and head - international tax policy at Nishith Desai Associates. 

She holds a Bachelor in Law (LL.B) from University of Mumbai. She is a Fellow Member with the Institute of Chartered Accountant of India and has completed the Company Secretarial program with the Institute of Company Secretaries of India. 

Shagoofa has been recognized under the “India’s Top 100 Women in Finance, 2020” list by AIWMI and under “Top 20 Emerging Legal Leaders, India” by RSG Emerging Leaders 2019. She has been recognized as “Distinguished Practitioner” and “Leading Lawyer”, for multiple years, by AsiaLaw Leading Lawyers rankings and Legal 500 rankings, respectively.

Mr. Abhishek Agrawal is the Chief Financial Officer and has been associated with Embassy REIT since August 2020. He has previously been the interim Chief Financial Officer from June 2022 till July 2023, prior to which he handled the role of Finance Controller of the Manager which included   financial   reporting, budgeting and management reporting, risk management and internal controls, compliance, business finance activities, fund- raise and valuations. Prior to joining the Manager, he was associated with S. R. Batliboi & Associates LLP between April 2008 and January 2017 and B S R & Co. LLP between January 2017 and August 2020 where he was Associate Director – Assurance and Audit Services. He has handled audits of large listed and unlisted companies across various sectors and specialised in the real estate sector with specific focus on commercial real estate. He was also involved in various assignments for the firms, including capital   market   transactions, assurance services for listed companies and leading large audit and assurance assignments.

With over 30 years of real estate experience, Mr. Cheng’s work experience has covered a comprehensive range of activities, including ground-up real estate development, real estate investment, fund management, business consulting, commercial banking operations, liquidity, and interest rate risk management.

As one of the key founding members of KaiLong in 2004, Mr. Cheng has built and led the team to become a leading player in Asian Pacific, Greater China and London's vibrant investment and asset management market. Since 2010, KaiLong has established five domestic Rmb funds totaling RMB2.8 billion. The fifth fund, launched in 2016, is the first RMB- denominated open-ended core fund in China, targeting income generating assets with an initial AUM of Rmb3.4 billion and target AUM of over Rmb15 billion. To date, KaiLong has raised a total of 12 domestic and overseas funds and invested over US$3.4 billion in 51 real estate projects. Of these, 29 have already been exited, with excellent risk-adjusted returns.

Before joining KaiLong, Mr. Cheng was the General Manager of Shui On Land. He oversaw the development and operations of Rainbow City, City Apartment, and Hangzhou Xi Hu Tiandi, as well as participating in the construction and operations management of Shanghai Xintiandi. Prior to that, Mr. Cheng held various senior positions with Standard Chartered Bank, including Greater China Head of Finance and Risk and Senior Manager of Marketing and Operations.

Norman is a Senior Partner in Rajah & Tann Singapore LLP and has been in active legal practice for the last 36 years. He joined the firm’s Corporate Real Estate Practice in 2017, with his team of 7 lawyers from Dentons Rodyk & Davidson (formerly Rodyk & Davidson) . The team has grown to 15 lawyers in addition to the existing lawyers of the Corporate Real Estate Department. He started his career at Rodyk & Davidson as a Practice Trainee from 1981 and was called to the Singapore Bar in 1982.

Norman graduated with LLB (Hons) from the National University of Singapore in 1979 and took his postgraduate for LLM with the London School of Economics and Political Science in 1984 and was under Secondment to Clifford Turner (now Clifford Chance) for a year after his postgraduate studies. He was under Scholarship from the Firm during the period he was away.

Neeraj Bansal is the Co-Head and Chief Operating Officer of India Global at KPMG in India. He drives the India Global growth agenda through cross-corridor strategic initiatives and supports diverse geographies under the India Global Banner.

A senior partner, Neeraj has over 25 years of experience in risk consulting practice. He has significant experience in supply chain function and has led multiple client engagements in centralisation/un-bundling of supply chains; process reviews; creation of procurement and contracting manuals and supporting clients’ implementation of SCM ERP modules for major companies operating in FMCG, consumer durables, pharma, EPC, ENR and textiles sectors.

Neeraj has served on multiple forums like the Advisory Executive Team of KPMG in India. He has been a member of KPMG Global BCRE Steering Group, Steering Group of JVs in ASEAN, Central Government Task Force on Project Time and Cost and advisory groups of media organizations. Further, Neeraj has been a member of various forums of industry associations, such as FICCI, RICS, NAREDCO, CREDAI and CII and has led industry association delegations to ASEAN and Middle Eastern countries.