Suntec City

Suntec City is a major multi-use development located in Marina Centre, a subzone of the Downtown Core in Singapore.

Design
Suntec City was designed by Tsao & McKown Architects with emphasis on Chinese geomancy (feng shui). The five buildings and the convention center are arranged so that they look like a left hand when viewed aerially. The Fountain of Wealth appears like a golden ring in the palm of the hand. As the fountain is made of bronze, it is believed that the balance of metal and water paves the way for success. Further, the specially selected Chinese name, 新达, means "new achievement".

Popularity

 * The Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) mentioned Suntec City as one of the largest commercial developments in Singapore.
 * Suntec City was awarded two FIABCI Prix d' Excellence awards for excellence in all aspects of real estate development (Overall winner and Commercial / Retail winner) in 1999. Suntec has claimed other prizes, including the 1998 Tourism Award from the Singapore Tourism Board.
 * Suntec City has been featured three times on The Amazing Race reality television show. Once on the US version Season 3 and twice on the Asian version in both Season 1 and Season 2.
 * At the centre of Suntec City lies the Fountain of Wealth, which Suntec claims to be the largest fountain in the world; this claim has however been contested, with Fountain Hills in Arizona also claiming the title. The Guinness World Records has recently withdrawn the "Largest Fountain" category from its website.

Suntec City office towers
Suntec City office towers comprise five buildings across Towers One to Five with four 45-storey and one 18-storey tower making up the five office towers at Suntec City. The latter has 28,000 square feet of net lettable floor area on each floor while the 45-storey towers consist of floor plates ranging from 10,000 to 14,000 square feet. In total, there are about 2.3 million square feet of office space.

Suntec City Mall
Suntec City Mall (Chinese: 新达城广场) is a shopping centre in Singapore, located within the Marina Centre subzone of the Downtown Core. Opened in 1994 together with initial phases of the Suntec City development, it was the largest shopping centre in Singapore with 888000 sqft of retail space until the opening of VivoCity in 2006. It also offers a club house called the Suntec City Guild House located on the fifth storey.

Zoning
The large size of the mall boasts some 360 outlets spread over 4 floors in an L-shaped configuration. To help shoppers to navigate around the mall, it was divided into four zones, namely: The Suntec City Bus Park will be due for upgrading works, which will expand bus lots from 9 to 20 (which requires removing bendy lots). In the meantime, a temporary bus park at Promenade was built during the upgrading.
 * The Galleria (Chinese: 画廊区), located on the ground floor of the Suntec Singapore International Convention and Exhibition Centre, offering high-end international labels targeted specifically at convention delegates and tourists. Currently, the Galleria zone is closed for upgrading works, due for completion in 2013.
 * The Tropics (Chinese: 热带区) offers a more wide-ranging choice of outlets for a wider budget range, with added emphasise on lifestyle merchandise and services. Currently, there are plans to link Level 3 to Galleria level, due for completion in 2015.
 * The Fountain Terrace (Chinese: 喷泉区) is located around the Fountain of Wealth, and specialises in food and beverage outlets. It had undergone minor renovation works from January 2012 and will be completing it on February 2013.
 * The Entertainment Centre (Chinese: 娱乐区) at the north-eastern end of the mall is dedicated to entertainment-related tenants such as a 5-theatre cineplex, a fitness centre, a gaming arcade, as well as the site of Carrefour's first outlet in Singapore, occupying 13,006 sqm over two floors. It will be closed for major upgrading works on April 2013 till January 2014.

Suntec Singapore International Convention and Exhibition Centre
The Suntec Singapore International Convention and Exhibition Centre (Chinese: 新達城新加坡國際會議展覽中心) was officially opened on 1 November 1994, and was previously known as the Singapore International Convention and Exhibition Centre (SICEC). Its current name was adopted in 2004 as part of a rebranding exercise. The convention centre has a total of 100,000 square metres of space, over multiple levels.

Initially part of the entire Suntec City development, the building is now separately owned by privately held ARA Harmony Fund and managed by ARA Singapore.

History
It is one of the largest multi-purpose convention and exhibition facilities in the centre of the city, the ICC has hosted some of the world’s biggest meetings, exhibitions and conventions – including the International Monetary Fund's (IMF) World Bank Congress in 1994.

Originally developed as part of the entire Suntec City, it was sold to private investors forming the ARA Harmony Fund, with SuntecREIT holding a 60.8% stake at a total cost of $139.75 million. The ARA Harmony Fund is a single-asset private fund that owns 100% of the venue.

In 2010, City Harvest Church reportedly acquired a substantial minority stake in the ARA Harmony Fund. The investment seeks to secure sustainable long-term use of the convention halls as a regular church venue through a co-own and lease model.

The church plans to offset rental costs with annual dividends by acquiring stakes in the single-asset private fund. It is expected to cost $310 million, including committed and future rentals, share acquisition, renovation and shifting costs over a number of years. While the shareholding details are not known, with the announcement of SuntecREIT's shareholdering at 60.8%, the maximum possible stakeholding by City Harvest Church is 39.2%.

On 21 July 2012, City Harvest Church announced details of its acquisition of Suntec Singapore's stake. It had first acquired 20% in 2010 and a further 19.2% in 2011 - aggregating a total of 39.2% at a cost of $97.75m.

Facilities
The centre is located in the central business district of Singapore. It has one of Asia's largest column-free space, in the form of multi-purpose convention halls each with 12,000 square metres of column-free space. A convention hall on level 6 and an exhibition hall on Level 4, each offers 12,000 square metres of space. The exhibition hall can be divided into 4 smaller halls, while level 6 consists of 11 rooms, an 800-seat theatre and 5 halls. It is usually configured as the City Harvest Church's 7,300-seat auditorium.

The building also boasts meeting rooms and ballrooms on the 2nd and 3rd floors, as well as food courts, restaurants, retail stores and a large lobby and event registration counters on the ground floor. Two basement levels provide ample parking.

Events
Several high-profile events and exhibitions have been held in the venue, and they include the World Trade Organization Ministerial Conference of 1994 and the World Economic Forum's East Asia Economic Summit, which has been held there several times. Other major events held at the venue include such as the Asian Casinos Expo, CAREER, IT Show, Modern Living, NATAS Travel Fair, Singapore Motorshow, VoiceComm, the International Food Festival, COMEX IT Fair, the World Stamp Championship, IAAPA Asian Expo, the World Down Syndrome Congress, Anime Festival Asia and the World Cyber Games.

In 2006, several Singapore 2006 events, including the 61st Annual Meetings of the Boards of Governors of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank Group, were being held at the venue. Several events of the 2010 Youth Olympic Games will also be the focus of the Convention Centre.

Singapore 2010 Youth Olympic Games
Located in the heart of Singapore’s business district, the International Convention Centre (ICC) is also conveniently located near the IOC Family Hotels, which is just a 10-minute walk away. It hosted Boxing, Fencing, Handball, Judo, Taekwondo, Wrestling during the 2010 Summer Youth Olympics.