IKEA, the Swedish furniture retail chain, said it will open a new global office from the Karle Special Economic Zone in Bengaluru, according to a Mint report.
“The availability of a large talent pool in India is one of the key reasons behind selecting the global office. The office will operate from the Karle Special Economic Zone in Bengaluru,” IKEA said in a statement.
In 2018, IKEA entered India by opening its first store in Hyderabad. Since then, the company has been slowly expanding its operations in the country with an offline presence in Mumbai and an online presence in Pune.
“The company will also open smaller format city centre stores and expand its online presence in other Indian cities in the future. Recently, the company launched Click & Collect Services in Hyderabad, which is safe and contactless. The aim is to reach approximately 100 million consumers in India over the next few years through a multichannel approach,” the company said.
IKEA said that it has been sourcing from India for over 35 years, has over 60 suppliers with 45,000 direct employees and 400,000 people in the extended supply chain in India producing for IKEA stores worldwide, the company said.
The Global Business Operations (GBO), the company said, is a capability and service organisation, responsible for implementing modern tools to meet growing business demands as well as to increase employee satisfaction.
Bengaluru will be part of a GBO network that operates in Poznan (Poland), Shanghai (China) and Baltimore (US). Digital, which is co-located with GBO in Bengaluru, will be a focal point and centre for digital development, innovation and operations. In addition, The Centres of Expertise (CoE) will provide leadership, best practices, research, support and training, the company said.
“India now joins our network of strong locations situated at strategic parts of the world with the establishment of GBO. India is not only a growing retail destination for us but also one of the strongest markets when it comes to global business operations capabilities,” Lalitha Indrakanti, Head of Global Business Operations for Ingka Group said.
She added that the GBO will help ‘simplify, standardise and modernise customer and business transactions, procurement operations, financial reporting and people operations’.
Founded in Sweden in 1943, IKEA’s retail business is operated through a franchise system. About 12 different groups of companies market and sell the IKEA product range under franchise agreements with Inter IKEA Systems B.V.
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