AEON buy CARREFOUR?

Aeon’s counterparts in Japan also acquired Carrefour’s hypermarkets

The most likely acquirers emanating from news reports globally were Casino Guichard from France and Aeon’s parent in Japan. The research firm viewed these candidates as those with the most to gain from such an acquisition and also the most unlikely to shutter any existing Carrefour hypermarket outlets in Malaysia.

Aeon’s counterparts in Japan also acquired Carrefour’s hypermarkets when the latter exited Japan in 2005 while the group’s existing departmental stores and supermarkets could co-exist with Carrefour’s hypermarkets, highlighted the research house.

Reports said that Carrefour was focused on China and Indonesia while reconsidering its presence in those countries where it was not the market leader or did not have the chance to be the market leader.

While Tesco was probably the most acquisition-hungry of existing players, Maybank Investment noted that it would be unlikely to operate all or even most of Carrefour’s hypermarkets, given the physical proximity of its stores with the latter’s stores.

In contrast, Aeon’s presence in Malaysia was entirely in the supermarket and department store formats. Should they choose so, Aeon could sustain a hypermarket format that complemented its existing presence without store closures.

Assuming all of Carrefour’s Malaysian sales were captured by the accounts of its holding company Magnificent Diagraph Sdn Bhd, Carrefour’s latest available accounts indicated that revenues were less than 50 per cent of Aeon’s in 2008.

In other news, Aeon has two parcels of land undergoing development to be completed by end-2010 and 2011 respectively, both located in Cheras. Another store in Perak by 2011 or 2012 was being planned with land acquisition costing RM27.1 million and pending approval from authorities.


By Borneo Post