Electroputere Parc shopping center to open in 2011 with Auchan main anchor

Real estate developer K&S Developments, owned by investors Kris Carton and Steven Van Den Bossche, will open the Electroputere Parc shopping center in Craiova in the second half of next year. The shopping center will feature an Auchan unit, the French retailer has announced. The new shopping center will be built on 12 hectares of land on the Electroputere Craiova industrial platform, owned by Al Arrab. The shopping center project will require an investment of EUR 90 million and will also host a Leroy Merlin unit, as well as retailers Decathlon, Kiabi and Norauto. All these retailers are owned internationally by the Mulliez family. Auchan will have a 11,000-sqm unit in the Craiova project, while Dectahlon, a 3,500 sqm store. Kiabi will occupy 1,800 sqm, Leroy Merlin, 10,000 sqm and Norauto, 1,100 sqm. The shopping center will also comprise a shopping galleria with over 100 stores. Kris Carton and Steven Van Den Bossche, also managing partners with BelRom real estate developer, have so far developed a series of shopping centers across Romania: Sibiu Shopping City, European Retail Park Targu Mures, ERP Braila, ERP Focsani, Hello Shopping Bacau, ERP Severin. Electroputere Craiova plans to pay its fiscal debt with the funds received from the sale of the 12 hectares within the 62-hectare platform. Auchan runs a chain of seven hypermarkets in Romania, between 8,500 sqm and 16,000 sqm each, in Bucharest, Pitesti, Targu Mures, Cluj – Napoca, Suceava and Timisoara. editor@romania-insider.com