IKEA has picked up 10 acres of commercial land in Gurgaon for a whopping Rs. 842 crore. (Image: Reuters)

In a record deal, Swedish furniture maker IKEA has picked up 10 acres of commercial land in Gurgaon for a whopping Rs. 842 crore from Haryana Urban Development Authority. In comparison, the tenth largest mall in India by size, Great India Place in Noida, has a plot area of nearly 20 acres. This development comes in even as IKEA aims set up its first store in India by 2018. The ten acres of land in Delhi-NCR is in line with IKEA’s larger plan to set up 25 stores over next 10 years in India. It also plans to double its sourcing from India to 600 million euros by 2020.

IKEA had also made many big-ticket purchases earlier, with over 23 acres of land in Turbhe, Navi Mumbai, for its second store from Tata-owned Rallis India for approximately ₹214 crore, and a 13 acre plot for over Rs 1,000 crore in Hyderabad. In comparison, High Street Phoenix in Mumbai, has a plot area of more than 75 acres, according to their website.

In August this year, PTI reported that work on the ₹1,000-crore facility located in the IT hub of Hyderabad, has gathered pace, so has the firm’s efforts to step up sourcing from India. In 2013, the company had got clearance from the Foreign Investment Promotion Board to invest ₹10,500 crore over 10 years for setting up stores in India.

Explaining IKEA’s journey in India, Patrik Antoni, Deputy Country Manager, IKEA India, had said in September, “Apart from Hyderabad, we have acquired land in Mumbai and Bengaluru, and are scouting for land in Delhi-NCR, Pune, Ahmedabad, Surat and Kolkata. While the Hyderabad store will be ready by Spring next year, work on the Mumbai project will commence in November.”

IKEA is in the process of setting up a 250-seater contact centre in Hyderabad by November. Simultaneously, it is working to set up the country’s first experience zone in Forum Mall here, he had said. “When the store gets launched (in Hyderabad) , out of the more than 10,000 items in it, more than 800 will be India-specific. We will also have a 1,000-seater restaurant, our biggest in any IKEA store across the world,” John Achillea, Managing Director, IKEA Telangana told media persons earlier in August.