Moving on in brief

Jon Lekander is the new head of the combined Indirect Investment Management team at Aberdeen Property Investors. This follows Aberdeen’s acquisitions of DEGI and Goodman Property Investors. Lekander was previously chief investment officer of Aberdeen Property Investors. Andrew Smith, former head of strategy at GPI, becomes chief investment officer. Rickard Backlund continues to lead the business.

Paul Idzik is the new group chief executive of DTZ, replacing Mark Struckett, who has stepped down. He was chief operating officer of Barclays and previously a partner at Booz & Co.

Chester Barnes has joined private equity firm JER Partners as head of European asset management, based in London. He reports to Malcolm Le May, president, Europe. Barnes was formerly head of asset management EMEA for Merrill Lynch Global Principal Investments in London. JER has also hired David Merchant as managing director in London, from Cheyne Capital Management, to oversee the European debut business.

JER is expanding in Europe and in September opened a Prague office staffed by Karim Habra, Christopher Zeuner and Petr Kosar, who all joined from GE Real Estate.

PricewaterhouseCoopers has expanded its real estate group with the addition of Simon Hardwick, who will lead the 10-strong team, including Adam Perry, Tim Hart and Amanda Crowe, who have all joined from Halliwells.

Trevor Goode has joined Ashurst’s real estate practice in London from Berwin Leighton Paisner. He joins the planning and public sector group run by partner Anthony Curnow.