China Property Joint Venture

RNS Number : 9454B

Tesco PLC

28 February 2011

 



28 February 2011

Tesco announces China property joint venture

Tesco has signed an agreement to set up a joint venture to develop shopping malls in China.

Fifty per cent of the joint venture will be owned by a consortium of leading Asian investors including Singapore's Metro Holdings. The total value of the project is in the region of £170m with Tesco and the joint venture consortium each investing approximately £30m of equity. Debt will be provided by banks including the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China and Standard Chartered Bank.

This joint venture will comprise of three shopping malls in Shenyang, Xiamen and Fuzhou, each of which includes a Tesco hypermarket as an anchor tenant.

The Lifespace shopping malls are part of Tesco's long term strategy to invest in building a substantial business in China. Tesco currently operates four Lifespace malls and 93 Tesco hypermarkets in China.

-Ends-

Contacts:

Media

Greg Sage

[phone]

Investors

Mark George

[phone]

Notes to editors

1.   Tesco currently operates 93 hypermarkets and 12 Express stores in the North, East and South of China. There are currently four Lifespace shopping malls in Qingdao, Qinhuangdao, Fushan and Anshan. Sales in China for the six months to 28 August 2009 were £498m.

2.   This is the second joint venture announced by Tesco to develop shopping malls in China. The first, for three shopping malls in Anshan, Fushan and Qinhuangdao, was announced in November 2009.

3.   Metro Holdings Ltd is a property and retail group listed in Singapore. The Group operates in key cities in Singapore, China, Malaysia and Indonesia. The Metro Group currently has interests in over 380,000 square metres of prime retail and office properties in its property portfolio.

 

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