Lulu Group, the $7 billion Abu Dhabi headquartered retail conglomerate, will invest ₹3,500 crore in Tamil Nadu to set up shopping malls, hypermarkets and food processing and logistics centre. An MoU for this was signed on Monday by Pooja Kulkarni, MD and CEO of Guidance Tamil Nadu and MA Ashraf Ali, Executive Director of Lulu Group in the presence of Chief Minister MK Stalin at the Abu Dhabi Chamber of Commerce HO in Abu Dhabi.
First Chennai mall by 2024
As per the MoU, the first shopping mall will come up in Chennai by 2024 while the first hypermarket is expected to open by this year-end itself in Coimbatore at Laxmi Mills compound, says a release.
The Lulu Group will also set up food processing and logistics centres for procuring and processing agri-produce for exports to Middle Eastern countries. A high-level delegation from Lulu will soon visit the state to finalise locations and related formalities.
In India, the group has three shopping malls in Kochi, Trivandrum and Bengaluru respectively. Its fourth mall is expected to be opened in Lucknow in the state of Uttar Pradesh by end of May this year.
225 hypermarkets worldwide
Lulu currently operates more than 225 hypermarkets and shopping malls in the Middle East, Egypt, Indonesia, Malaysia and India. The group employs over 57,000 people globally. Lulu hypermarkets and department stores have a 32 per cent share of the retail market in Gulf Cooperation Council countries, the release said.
A State government release said that the LuLu group will generate employment of around 5,000 persons.