Pantaloon Retail clocks Rs 181 cr sales in April

Mumbai, May 11 (UNI) Retail major Pantaloon Retail (India) Limited (PRIL) has witnessed a spurt of 67 per cent in its retail sales for April 2006 at Rs 180.55 crore as against Rs 108.11 crore for the same period last year.

Sales for value retailing shot up by 85.76 per cent to Rs 133.34 crore as against Rs 71.78 crore during the same period last year while lifestyle retailing sales grew 29.95 per cent at Rs 47.21 crore as against Rs 36.33 crore for the same period last year, the release said.

Pantaloon Retail has entered into a joint venture with CapitaLand, Singapore, south-east Asia's largest property developer with a commitment to invest USD 75 million in the Horizon Realty Fund LLC, managed by Ambit Investment Advisory Co Ltd, a subsidiary of PRIL, the release added.

Both the companies have also entered into an agreement to set up a 50:50 joint venture in mall management and fund management services.

The company has also allied itself with the Chennai Business School to offer a two-year full-time retail management programme in an endeavour for continuous talent creation in the Indian retail sector.

This is the fourth such tie-up for the company, the release said, pointing out that it has also partnered with Madurai Kamaraj Univeristy to ofer two separate retail-based programmes and also create a Centre of Excellence which will focus at various areas like developing retail management academic programmes, research, consultancy services and others.

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