Carrefour is expanding its hypermarket network in Romania by 7 stores a year and expects to reach around 40 stores by 2012, according to a report released by Hyparlo, a division of the French group. Investments in expansion are estimated at 450 million euros for the 2009-2012 period.

The French are attempting to preserve their leading position in terms of sales on the hypermarket segment, considering that, over the last two years, competitors that entered the market more recently, Real and Kaufland, left the Carrefour network behind in terms of the number of stores.

According to Hyparlo (the company that holds the Carrefour hypermarkets in Romania, as well as several stores in France), Carrefour's market share in the hypermarket sector will stand at around 50 percent by 2012. According to 2006 data reported by Romanian hypermarket operators, the French network had an around 47 percent market share.

Carrefour expects its sales to overshoot the one billion-euro mark by the end of this year, when it will have 18 hypermarkets on the local market. At present, the only retailers with turnovers in the range of billions of euros in Romania are German groups Metro (Metro Cash & Carry), Real Hypermarket and Rewe (Selgros Cash & Carry, Billa, Penny Market). According to market research company Planet Retail, modern retail in Romania stood at 7 billion euros in 2007.

Last year, Carrefour also entered the supermarket segment in Romania, sooner than it had originally planned, after it took over the 21-store network Artima.

The first Carrefour hypermarket in Romania was opened in 2001, being operated by Hyparlo. In 2006, the Carrefour group fully took over Hyparlo, in an international transaction, and, on the Romanian market, this change led to an acceleration in the network's expansion. In 2008, the French retailer will have the highest expansion rate