Swedish furniture chain IKEA, which is in the process of establishing its first shop in India, is looking to scale up sourcing of furniture from the country and also plans to procure bigger items for its global operations.

The furniture giant, which intends to invest around Rs 10,500 crore in India, has been sourcing many products, including textiles, carpets, metals, plastic, lighting and decorative items, for its global sales for last 26 years.

"We are really into many different things. We are also sourcing small furniture as of now but are looking for bigger furniture. We can see great opportunities to do a lot more in many different segments," IKEA South Asia Trading Area Manager
Jessica Anderen told PTI here.

When asked about the kind of big furniture the company is looking to source, she said it would be both wooden and metal. IKEA, which inaugurated its latest designed Punja loom here, used for producing durries, had sourced goods totaling USD 450 million from India across segments in 2012-13 fiscal from its network of 54 suppliers and is looking to double it in the next five years.

"...it would be fantastic if we can double the business in the next five years in India," she said, adding that it would also depend how much capabilities India has. When asked whether it has roped in new partners for its sourcing from India, Anderen said: "We are constantly mapping and looking into other areas... However, it would depend on factors such as expertise, raw material, right partners and location."

IKEA, which sources its carpets from Bhadoi for its global operations, has developed the new punja loom for carpet weavers under its 'made by people' project.

The new Punja loom has been developed in southern India and installed on a pilot basis at Eastern Home Industries, IKEA's supplier of carpet.

Anderen said IKEA was unable to source the required number of carpets from India and implementation of the new Punja loom may solve the problem as it is designed to produce better quality products and increase productivity by 25 to 40
per cent.

After getting approval from the government for its Rs 10,500 crore investment, IKEA is exploring four cities -- Delhi & NCR, Mumbai, Bangalore and Hyderabad - to open its first store.

"We are looking for four major cities. Delhi & NCR, Hyderabad, Bombay and Bangalore. For the moment its all open," said an IKEA spokesperson, adding that the company is analysing the market and factors such as availability of land.

IKEA is "discussing with different states to buy land... we have quite a lot of prerequisites on how we open an IKEA store to reach as many as possible, as metro line connected to the site and so on. We hope we would be able to have some good news in the near future", she added.

Source: Moneycontrol

Posted and edited by  Hanbao News Department

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