KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 23 — Dairy Farm International Ltd is leaving Malaysia’s grocery retail sector in which it operates the Giant, Mercato and Giant Mini chains.
The Hong Kong-based firm said it was exiting the sector after over two decades to focus on growing its Guardian Health and Beauty chain.
DFI announced that it has agreed to sell its stake in the local operations — GCH Retail (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd — to a Malaysian conglomerate headed by Datuk Andrew Lim, the group executive chairman of KL Sogo.
“We are delighted to be able to transition our food business to such a well-respected and successful local retail group, who will also be retaining our dedicated team members as well,” said Chris Bush, DFI Retail Group’s CEO of Southeast Asia.
GCH started its operations here in 1999 when it took over the homegrown Giant supermarket chain at the time.
According to The Edge Markets, GCH had been rapidly closing its outlets since 2019, and more than halved its number of outlets by 2021.
* A previous version of the report contained errors that have since been corrected
