Who Owns UPDC Plc, and What It Has Actually Delivered

Two listed companies own more than nine tenths of UPDC Plc between them, and the filings that prove it are public. Custodian Investment Plc holds 9,486,390,663 ordinary shares, or 51.11 per cent. UAC of Nigeria Plc holds 7,697,451,236 shares, or 41.47 per cent. Both figures come from the company's own 2025 annual report and accounts. For a buyer trying to work out who stands behind a Nigerian developer, that is an unusually clear answer, and it is the kind of answer most developer profiles cannot give.

The company is registered as UACN Property Development Company Plc under RC 321582, a number that appears on its filings at the Nigerian Exchange, where it trades under the ticker UPDC. Its directory entry carries contact and location details. What follows is the registry and filing record behind them.

How the ownership got that way

The present structure is the result of a 2020 restructuring that went through the courts. The Federal High Court of Nigeria, sitting in Lagos, made an order on 15 July 2020 in suit FHC/L/CS/824/2020 convening a meeting of shareholders for 26 October 2020. The purpose was to consider a Scheme of Arrangement between the company and the holders of its fully paid ordinary shares.

Under that scheme, 1,515,501,818 units of UPDC Real Estate Investment Trust were transferred to eligible shareholders, accompanied by a reduction of share capital of 4,698,055,636 naira. In plain terms, the property trust was separated out and handed to shareholders directly, and the share capital was written down to match. Custodian Investment Plc acquired its majority stake in the same year.

The trust remains a separately listed vehicle with its own reporting. Its unaudited first quarter statement for 2026 puts total assets at 37.74 billion naira and net assets attributable to unit holders at 36.23 billion naira as at 31 March 2026. Anyone assessing the development company should treat the trust as a distinct entity rather than as an asset on the developer's books.

Who signs the accounts

The 2025 annual report names six directors. Oluwole Oshin is non-executive chairman, appointed 13 January 2021. Odunayo Ojo is chief executive officer, appointed 4 May 2021. The non-executive directors are Folasope Aiyesimoju, appointed 6 August 2018, Oyekunle Osilaja, appointed 10 January 2020, Adeniyi Falade, appointed 5 January 2021, and Bidemi Fadayomi, appointed 28 July 2022. Afolake Temitope Kalaro is company secretary and Francis Falola is chief financial officer. The report records no resignations during the year.

The auditor is Deloitte & Touche, at Civic Towers, Plot GA 1, Ozumba Mbadiwe Avenue, Victoria Island, Lagos. Two subsidiaries are named: UPDC Hotels Limited and UPDC Facility Management Limited.

One regulatory item sits in the same report. The company states that during the period under review it "was penalised for the late filing of its 2024 Audited Financial Statements." That is a reporting-timeliness penalty of the sort the Nigerian Exchange applies to listed issuers, and the company disclosed it itself. It is not a finding about the quality of the accounts, and it should not be read as one.

Announced against built

A developer's filings tell you who owns it. Only its project history tells you whether it finishes what it starts, and here the record is specific enough to check.

Hampshire, a five hectare mixed-use scheme at Sangotedo on the Lekki-Epe Expressway, was reported as completed and sold out, with 62 serviced plots, in BusinessDay on 28 April 2025. Brompton City, described in the same report as sitting on 300,000 square metres and developed in four phases, had its first phase of 100,000 square metres completed and sold out, with work on phases two and three, a further 125,000 square metres between them, due to begin.

A year later the picture had moved. ThisDay reported on 28 April 2026 that phases two and three were more than half sold, that Brompton City had produced more than 8.7 billion naira in revenue, and that phases four and five were planned. Two further schemes spanning 30 to 50 hectares were described only as Project Alpha and Project Beta, which means they are announcements rather than deliverables and should be treated that way until plot numbers and titles appear.

The financial trajectory behind that is on record. Revenue moved from 5.344 billion naira in 2023 to 11.787 billion naira in 2024, with profit before tax of 1.309 billion naira that BusinessDay described as the highest in nine years. Group turnover for 2025 was reported at 12.9 billion naira, with the facility management subsidiary contributing 1.6 billion naira. The share price rose from 1.49 naira at the start of 2025 to close to 5 naira by year end. Management has also floated a proposed 100 billion naira real estate investment fund, which at the time of reporting was a stated intention and not a launched product.

The older record, and why it matters

The company's history runs well past the current board. The International Finance Corporation disclosed a project with UACN Property Development Company Plc on 21 February 2007, approved 10 May 2007, to help finance its capital expenditure and working capital programme for 2007 through 2009. The money was earmarked mainly for the Victoria Island Mall Plaza project, described in the disclosure as 36 high-end town houses, a 15 storey office tower, a multistorey car park with 252 spaces, a shopping centre and a 160 room hotel.

At Festac, The Guardian reported on 14 September 2015 that Festival Mall was being developed by UACN Property Development Company Plc with ACA and UPDC Real Estate Investment Trust as joint venture partners, with Shoprite as anchor retailer and a four screen Silverbird cinema, and gave a target delivery of October or November that year. The 2025 annual report describes the group's Festival Hotel as having undergone operational reengineering and infrastructure upgrades during the year.

That a company has been financed by a development institution and has run joint ventures with a listed trust is worth knowing. It does not substitute for checking the title on the specific plot being sold.

What to check before buying

The useful questions for a buyer are narrower than the corporate picture. Ask which registered entity is named as vendor on the contract, since UACN Property Development Company Plc, UPDC Hotels Limited, UPDC Facility Management Limited and UPDC Real Estate Investment Trust are separate legal persons. Ask for the title document on the specific plot, and perfect it, because a developer's balance sheet does not transfer title. For a phased scheme such as Brompton City, ask which phase the plot sits in and what the completion position of that phase actually is, not the scheme as a whole.

For listed developers, the annual report and the exchange filings are the cheapest verification available, and they are free. For developers that are not listed, the registry record and the project history are what remain, which is the delivery history Bektu exists to compile and make checkable at https://bektu.com.