Danube outlines global expansion for ‘BUILDMART’ brand

Danube Building Materials, the leader in construction, building materials and shop fitting industries, has announced its expansion plan that aims to penetrate the Africa market and strengthen its presence in the Middle East through dealer and franchise networks. This follows the opening of the first ‘Danube BUILDMART' branch at in India, which marked the leading company's 22^nd global store. Specifically, the company revealed that it expanding to Qatar and other parts of Saudi Arabia and Oman, as well as in China, where it currently has one of its major manufacturing plants.

Initially established as a building materials supplier, Danube transformed into a one-stop shop concept called ‘Danube BUILDMART' in 2009, offering products from a host of reputed vendors as well as expert product and design advice under a single roof. Today, there are a total of nine ‘Danube BUILDMART' stores in operation, which the company hopes to grow to 16 branches by 2010 through the AED 200 million expansion plan it has embarked on since the second quarter of this year. Including its non-‘BUILDMART' stores, the company has a total of 22 global retail facilities - 16 in the UAE, two in Oman, one each in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and two in India as well. The company has also invested AED 50 million in a new 1.3 million square feet manufacturing facility in TechnoPark, which will be functional by early 2011.

"With the global economy approaching the recovery phase and investors starting to regain confidence in the regional market as a result of massive government actions to revive the construction and real estate industries, we are expecting the demand for building materials in the Middle East and Africa to witness a significant increase this year," said Rizwan Sajan, Chairman, Danube Building Materials. "We have already made massive investments toward additional manufacturing hubs to boost our production and sufficiently address the expected rise in demand, and now our focus is to establish highly convenient ‘Danube BUILDMART' stores in the most strategic locations within our target regions."

Danube has also recently launched an AED 15 million 'Danube BUILDMART' in Ibn Battuta Mall, Dubai, thereby marking its third retail branch to be based within a mall, which is a new concept pioneered by the company. Spanning an area of 15,000 sq. feet, 'Danube BUILDMART' in Ibn Battuta Mall offers products from a host of reputed international and regional vendors under a single roof, installed in an actual home set-up to allow customers to enjoy a more personalised shopping experience with excellent service and design assistance.

"Staying true to our commitment to being the pioneer in the industry, we are taking major strides to acquire major market share thought the MENA region in the next five years. We believe that this is the perfect time to expand to be able to place ourselves in a strategic position to fully leverage the opportunities once the market fully recovers," concluded Sajan.

Driven by the significant growth it has witnessed in the recent years, Danube recently announced that it is looking at an initial public offering (IPO) listing in Saudi Arabia or the UAE within the next 5 years. Targeting to secure AED 2.5 to AED 3 billion in total revenues in the next three to four years, after hitting a total of AED 1 billion in annual turnover despite the challenges presented by the financial crisis, the company revealed that it is also open to dual listing in both countries.