October 20 (SeeNews) - Romanian do-it-yourself retailer Dedeman has reconsidered its plans to open a store in Moldova's capital Chisinau due to red tape, the law firm representing its interests in Moldova said on Friday.
The 20 million euro ($23.6 million) investment announced by Dedeman in 2014 was cancelled due to administrative barriers, excessive bureaucracy and lack of certainty regarding important decisions by the local authorities on the investment project, Moldovan law firm Hanganu, Tanase & Partners said in a press release.
The project has been pending approval by Chisinau's municipal council since December 2016, the law firm added.
The store in Moldova would have employed 200 and would have been Dedeman's first presence in a foreign market.
The company had plans for a second store in Moldova, in the economic free zone of Balti.
Meanwhile, Dedeman is actively expanding its operations in Romania.
So far this year, Dedeman opened four stores in Cluj, Iasi, Bucharest and Hunedoara following a total investment of 74 million euro. The new openings increased Dedeman's network in Romania to 48 stores.
The retailer, which sells construction materials and home improvement products, said at the end of last year that it planned to expand its network to 50 stores in the long term.
Dedeman, founded in 1992 by two Romanian entrepreneurs, currently has 10,000 employees. Its founders, Dragos Paval and Adrian Paval, are estimated to own a fortune of 920-950 million euro, according to the Top 300 Wealthiest Men in Romania 2016 ranking made by Romanian magazine Capital.
In August, Real estate developer AFI Europe and Dedeman agreed to cancel the sale transaction of AFI Park office buildings 1-3 in Bucharest.
In June Dedeman's owners decided to tap into the real-estate sector and signed a pre-contract to buy three office buildings from AFI Europe, with the reserved option to also buy another two.
According to local media reports, the estimated value of the transaction for all five buildings would have been as high as 164 million euro.
($ = 0.8471 euro)
Dedeman SRL is among the biggest companies in SEE. You can download our SEE Top 100 ranking
here or subscribe to our free Top 100 newsletter
here