Patra sets sights on Beijing, Vienna

       Restaurant operator S&P Syndicate will open its first Patra restaurants in Beijing and Vienna by the fourth quarter of this year.

       The company is also studying the possible launch of a new overseas restaurant brand to capture the casual dinning segment, said Pravesvudhi Raiva, the company's president.
       He said that the opening of Patra restaurants in Beijing and Vienna would require investment of Bt15 million and Bt50 million respectively.
       S&P Global, the overseas investment arm of S&P Syndicate, will hold a 90-per-cent stake in the local joint venture set to open Patra restaurant in Beijing while the other 10 per cent would be held by Taiwanese investor Charles Hsueh. For Vienna in Austria, the investment will be directly allocated by S&P Global's two major subsidiaries based in the UK and Switzerland, S&P Restaurant UK and Thai Development.
       "There are currently about 30 Thai restaurants in Beijing. Anyway, they are not good representatives of Thai restaurants in the market," he said.
       Pravesvudhi said that there was no premium Thai restaurant in Beijing at this moment. The company thinks that Beijing will be a good starting point for the company in expanding its Patra restaurants into China in the near future.
       "We have studied such business opportunities in China for two years. We have seen a great potential to represent premium Thai restaurants in the market," he said.
       Pravesvudhi said that Vienna is also a potential bright market for Thai restaurants.
       "People in Vienna have high purchasing power. There are very few Thai restaurants in the market. Most of the Asian restaurants available in Vienna are Korean and Chinese," he said.
       He added that the company's policy was to open at least one Patra restaurant in many major cities abroad.
       "In addition to China, we are studying opportunities to open a Patra restaurant in India in the near future," said Pravesvudhi.
       S&P Global currently operates four Patra restaurants in England, one in Geneva and one in Switzerland.
       Vitoon Sila-on, senior vice present for domestic operations, said that the company would focus on the expansion of S&P restaurants domestically.
       "We have already opened 18 new S&P restaurants domestically in the first half of this year, and between 25 and 30 new outlets will be opened by the second half, bringing the total number of restaurants to between 340 and 350 y by the end of this year," he said.
       He added that the company would focus on opening small bakery shops with total space of about 30 square metres serving baked goods and quick-meal products. About five big restaurant outlets occupying a total space of more than 200 square metres and having between 70 and 80 seats will be opened this year.
       "Our policy is to keep expanding S&P restaurants domestically to utilise the production capacities of our food and bakery factories and lower their costs," said Vitoon.
       He said that including new restaurant outlets, the company achieved 10 per cent growth in the first half of this year, which is lower than the 14-per-cent growth targeted earlier in the year. However, same-store growth was less than 5 per cent in the first half of the year.
       "We want to open about 40 new S&P restaurants domestically in all potential locations such as gas stations, hospitals and in front of universities. We will focus more on expanding our restaurants into the provinces," said Vitoon.
       S&P Syndicate expects to achieve Bt4 billion in total sales this year, including its overseas business.