New owner of former IKEA factory in Veliky Novgorod wants to restart production within two to three months

ST. PETERSBURG. March 27 (Interfax) - Invest Plus LLC, a special purpose vehicle (SPV) controlled by Vadim Osipov, CEO and co-owner of St. Petersburg-based Slotex Group, is preparing to restart furniture manufacturing at Ikea Industry Novgorod LLC, the former factory of Sweden's IKEA in Veliky Novgorod, within the next two to three months, Slotex's press service said in a statement.

"We are interested in resuming operations as soon as possible. Our goal is to return the products of the Novgorod factory to the Russian furniture market as soon as possible," Osipov said in the statement.

As noted, the new owner plans to retain the number employees and maintain the working conditions at Ikea Industry Novgorod for at least a year.

Ikea Industry Novgorod LLC comprises a factory for manufacturing laminated chipboard and a modular furniture factory. The production capacity of the factory for manufacturing laminated chipboard is more than 500,000 cubic meters of polished chipboard per year, and the modular furniture factory can manufacture more than seven million cabinet cases and kitchen furniture units per year.