Ikea announces further investment in Chinese market

Ingka Group, the parent group of Swedish home furnishing giant Ikea, will invest 5.3 billion yuan ($772.9 million) in China in the fiscal year 2023, the company said in a press conference on Wednesday.

The investment will be used for further business digitalization, construction of new stores and shopping malls as well as the integration of multiple distribution channels, said Anna Pawlak Kuliga, CEO and president of Ikea China.

Lydia Song, vice-president of Ikea China, said that the company will announce the investment of a wind power project in China later this year.

As to the store expansion plan in China for fiscal year 2023, which will start on Sept 1, Ikea will open a smaller scale store in Hefei, the capital city of East China's Anhui province. It will also launch a second store in Xi'an of Shaanxi province.

In early July, Ikea shut down its 8,500-square-meter store in northeast Shanghai's Yangpu district. The company's China vice-president Lydia Liu said the major purpose is to realize more effective mapping in the city. While Ikea will remain "agile" in China over the next few years, Shanghai will remain as one of the key investment destinations for Ikea, she said.

Ikea announced a three-year strategy in 2019 especially for the Chinese market, which included 10 billion yuan of investment. The company announced at the Wednesday press conference that it has fulfilled that investment target, with which Ikea developed more products and solutions for Chinese consumers, set up an omni-channel distribution network and offered more discounts. Over the past three years, Ikea's services have extended to nearly 1 billion Chinese consumers with the online platforms such as the Tmall store and online shopping mall on WeChat.