Springleaf Tower () is a 37- storey, office and residential skyscraper located in the central business district of

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bor ...

located on 3 Anson Road and near Prince Edward Road, The development is in the zone of

Shenton Way Shenton Way is a major trunk road serving Singapore's Central Area and is most commonly known for the commercial skyscrapers flanking both sides of the road. The road is a one-way street that starts at the junction of Boon Tat Street, Raffles Qua ...

and

Tanjong Pagar Tanjong Pagar (New Rumi Spelling, alternatively spelled ''Tanjung Pagar'') is a historic district located within the Central Business District in Singapore, straddling the Outram, Singapore, Outram Planning Area and the Downtown Core under the ...

near other skyscrapers, such as 8 Shenton Way, MAS Building, International Plaza, and Anson Centre, all of which are roughly 100 metres away. It is a Grade A office building.

History

Springleaf Tower was completed in 2002. Firms involved in the development include CapitaLand Commercial Limited, CapitaLand Limited, Benson Global, and DTZ Debenham Tie Leung (South East Asia) Private Limited. However, the Springleaf Tower's construction was not smooth. In the late 1990s, the developer of the building, a subsidiary of the now defunct Ban Hin Leong Group, ran into financial problems. It was unable to pay its contractors for the completion of the 37-storey building. This led to the UOB Case.

UOB Case

The Ban Hin Leong Group suggested that one of the contractors, Yongnam Holdings, purchase a floor, and that it set off the value of its work against the sale price of the floor. It was agreed to by

United Overseas Bank United Overseas Bank Limited (), often known as UOB, is a Singaporean multinational banking corporation headquartered in Singapore, with branches mostly found in most Southeast Asian countries. Founded in 1935 as United Chinese Bank (UCB) by S ...

(UOB), who was the mortgagee. However, after Yongnam completed the work, UOB refused to release its mortgage. UOB said that it did not encourage or endorse the barter arrangement and later foreclosed on the building. Yongnam then sued UOB to protect its interest. UOB subsequently lost the case, and was asked to cede ownership of the floor to Yongnam.

Building sale

Twelve floors in Springleaf Tower were sold in January 2007 for S$134 million, bought by Macquarie Global Property Advisors. Just a few months later, in October 2007, the same twelve floors were sold again, at $225 million. This equates an increase of almost 70 percent. It was bought by SEB Asset Management, part of

SEB Group Skandinaviska Enskilda Banken AB (, abbreviated SEB, is a northern European financial services group headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden. In Sweden and the Baltic countries, SEB has a full financial service offering. In Denmark, Finland, Norway, ...

Cabinet fire

On 31 January 2008, there was a fire at Han's restaurant and the tenants at Springleaf Tower were all asked to evacuate their offices. The

Singapore Civil Defence Force The Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) is an uniformed organisation in Singapore under the Ministry of Home Affairs that provides emergency services such as firefighting, technical rescue, and emergency medical services, and coordinates nati ...

sent two

fire engines The Fire Engines were a post-punk band from Edinburgh, Scotland. The Fire Engines were an influence on many bands that followed, including Franz Ferdinand and The Rapture, with Meat Whiplash and The Candyskins both taking their names from Fire ...

, two fire bikes, three support vehicles, one ambulance and one red Rhino to the scene. In total, about 300 occupants of the building were evacuated. It was soon found that a cabinet in the restaurant started the fire.

References

External links