The UP government on Friday allotted 12.3 acres in the city to IKEA for what will be the Swedish furniture giant’s first ‘meeting place’ venture in India – a shopping, entertainment and business centre revolving around the flagship IKEA store.
The plot in Sector 51 was allotted by the Noida Authority to INGKA Centres India Pvt Ltd, which is a subsidiary of the INGKA group that owns most IKEA stores. The company began negotiations with the Noida Authority in October 2019 over terms of payment for the plot and the deal was finalised after it paid Rs 850 crore.
Chief minister Yogi Adityanath presided over the event virtually from Lucknow when Noida Authority transferred the land. The company paid Rs 56 crore as stamp duty to the government to get the land title transferred.
The Noida store will be IKEA’s third. It opened a store in Hyderabad 2018 and another in Navi Mumbai last year. The company said in a statement said IKEA will develop an anchored retail destination and INGKA’s 45th ‘meeting place’ globally at Noida. “Delhi-NCR is one of the most important markets in India and we are happy to announce the first store here,” IKEA India CEO Peter Betzel said in a statement.
Noida Authority CEO Ritu Maheshwari said the IKEA centre will bring in investments to the tune of Rs 5,500 crore and generate employment opportunities for more than 2,000 people. “The company will complete the entire project within a period of seven years,” said Maheshwari.