Clothing maker H&M plans to open shop in India

Sweden-based budget fashion retailer Hennes & Mauritz (H&M), the world's second-largest apparel seller, plans to invest in single-brand retail stores in India for which it  has applied for permission.

This is the second Swedish firm after IKEA which plans to invest in India after the country liberalised its FDI policy.

"We have been looking at India for quite some time. We are in the application process and we will see how it goes," H&M chief executive officer Karl Johan Persson told newspersons briefly after meeting commerce minister Anand Sharma in New Delhi on Tuesday.

The firm is looking at wholly-owned units since India relaxed its foreign investment policy in retail, but Persson did not share details on numbers.

"We will start with a few stores and will see if everything happens as we hope, then we will expand heavily," he said.

Like furniture maker IKEA, which is waiting for its own application to be approved, H&M hopes to cash in on a growing urban middle-class with a strong demand for western-lifestyle products.

H&M, the world's second-largest apparel retailer after Zara owner Inditex, has the bulk of its business in Europe where demand has been hit by the region's debt crisis.

Before Perrson left for Delhi, an H&M spokesperson said in Stockholm, "We will now present H&M and our plans for India. We are interested in opening stores there. What we are doing now is preparing to apply to start a wholly-owned subsidiary."