Japan’s richest man Tadashi Yanai wants to build his business with India in Future. He met India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Commerce Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday. During this meeting, he sparked his thought that his billion dollar apparel company UNIQLO is preparing to enter India. UNIQLO has been studying the Indian Retail Market for the past two years.
Mr. Yanai is the chairman and chief executive officer of Fast Retailing Co. Ltd, which owns UNIQLO, the largest apparel retailer in Japan. “He is definitely interested in setting up in India and has been studying the retail market to Understand how to enter India.”, said Rahul Prasad, Managing Director, Pike Preston Partners Ltd., a boutique advisory firm on mergers  and acquisitions in the fashion and luxury segments. Mr. Yanai has already manufacturing partners in China, Vietnam, Bangladesh, and Indonesia.
About UNIQLO:
UNIQLO, the largest apparel retailing company was established in 1984 in Hiroshima, Japan. It was headed by Tadashi Yanai, the richest man of Japan. Since then, the brand has evolved from a chain of roadside stores to an international leader in style, quality and fun.
UNIQLO is a Japanese casual wear designer, manufacturer, retailer. This fashion retailer company is fully owned subsidiary of Fast Retailing Co. Ltd. This company has manufacturing partners like China, Bangladesh, Indonesia, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Macau, Malasiya, Russsia, Singapore, Australia and more top leading countries in the world. Now UNIQLO is heading towards India to enter in the Indian Retail Market.
On September 2, 2009, Fast Retailing Co. Ltd. announced that UNIQLO would target annual group sales of 5 trillion yen ($ 61.2 billion) and pretax profit from operations of 1 trillion yen ($ 12.2 billion) by 2020.
UNIQLO is Japan’s largest apparel retailing company. It’s biggest rival Zara has already entered into the Indian Retail Market. Now Zara is operating 9 stores in India through a JV and TATA Group’s trend. UNIQLO garners 45% of its sales from women’s clothing, 35% from menswear, and the remaining 20% from kidswear. Mr. Yanai has pushed for aggressive store openings leading to a world wide network of more than 4,000 doors in the next eight years.
By the end of February, this company opened 3 stores in Indonesia, 14 in Malaysia, 11 in Philippines, 16 in Singapore and 14 in Thailand.
Indo-Japan Economic Relationship:
Economic and trade relations between India and Japan have steadily grown during Manmohan Singh’s tenure as Prime Minister. Annual Trade between India and Japan now stands at a healthy $18 billion. Japan is India’s fourth largest investor, with investments of over $ 14 billion.
