Dubai consumer electronics retailer Jumbo Electronics has confirmed it is closing all of its stores in India and axing staff, as part of plans to quit the country and focus on the GCC.
Jumbo has informed its 145 staff in India to look for new jobs and intends to close its 16 stores in India by March. A team from Dubai is overseeing the closure process.
A spokesperson for Jumbo Group in the UAE said the closures would not affect operations in the GCC, and that the group intended to ramp up its presence in the region. The spokesperson said: “Notwithstanding the decision to exit retail in India, the Jumbo Group has introduced several region-firsts in the GCC, including in the OmniChannel space through our portal Jumbo.ae.
“We are committed to strengthening the hugely successful integrated offerings of the Jumbo Group with a robust growth strategy and a focused five-year development road map for the company.
“As one of the Arabian Gulf’s most well-established and respected corporates, we are committed to continuing to both innovate and refresh our operating model.
“These are exciting times for our business, which has constantly grown and evolved over the past four decades, and we are looking forward to an equally successful future for our staff, customers and partners.”
Press reports from India had said Jumbo took the decision in order to curb mounting losses, and that is in talks with cellphone retailer Hotspot to sell its assets in India.
The retailer’s India stores are located in the National Capital Region, Mumbai, Pune, Lucknow, Ghaziabad and Bengaluru. It has also shut down a handful of other stores in recent years.
The group is private so only limited financial information is available. It announced in February 2015 that its growth strategy envisaged doubling net revenues by 2020 – GCC sales grew by 25 per cent in April to December 2014 compared to the same period the previous year.
However, in India its revenues have been plummeting, according to India’s Economic Times, citing reports at the country’s Registrar of Companies (Roc). Jumbo Electronics posted revenue of Rs335 crore ($48 million) in 2014-15, and losses of Rs14.63 crore ($2.1 million) that same year, it said.
Financials for 2015-16 are not yet available at the RoC.
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