Wumart Stores, the largest supermarket chain in Beijing, believes the capital city will follow Hong Kong's business model: the bigger the better.
Chairman Zhang Wenzhong expects that Beijing will evolve to become similar to Hong Kong, where about 70 per cent of the supermarket sector is controlled by Li Ka-shing's ParknShop and Dairy Farm International Holdings' Wellcome, over the next three to five years.
'We may have three major operators instead of two like Hong Kong,' he said.
Since listing on the Growth Enterprise Market in November 2003, Wumart has been actively growing through mergers and acquisitions.
Mr Zhang said several potential targets were in the firm's sights after it agreed to buy a 75 per cent stake in Beijing MerryMart Chainstores Development - the fourth-largest chain in the capital - for 370 million yuan last month.
'We are triple the size of the No3 operator. With our scale, we have an advantage over our rivals,' he said.
He said the company's challenges were to enhance operational efficiency and maintain cost control by introducing centralised information technology and management systems.