Sweden’s IKEA said on August 1, 2007 that the contribution from Asia-Pacific to the group’s total sales could triple to 10 percent within six years, creating a huge challenge for the world’s largest furniture retailer.
“It’s possible,” Ian Duffy, IKEA president for Asia Pacific, told Reuters in an interview. “That is very significant, and the group is growing as well.” Privately owned IKEA plans to add six new stores in the Asia-Pacific region next year, three in China and three in Japan, on top of the nine stores IKEA now manages in the region.
The IKEA group also has eight stores operated as franchises in Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia and Hong Kong.
