Sobha plans to develop 12 mn sq ft for Rs 22,000-mn

Chennai/Bangalore: Sobha Developers, a Bangalore-based real estate company, plans to take up 12 million square feet of development during fiscal 2008-09 for about Rs 2,200 crore.

Announcing this during the launch of ‘Sobha Lifestyle’, a residential project, company’s managing director J C Sharma said, “Of the 12 million square feet, 4 million will be commercial which will include hospitality and retail.”

“This will cover 5-6 cities, mainly in south India and funding is through customer advance, internal accruals and debt. We hope to complete smaller projects in 2-3 years and the larger ones in 4-5 years,” he added.

In 2007-08, the company took up projects on a similar scale. In the residential space, ongoing projects are 28 and forthcoming number 20. In commercial development ongoing is three projects aggregating 0.39 million square feet and forthcoming 16 projects aggregate to 15.11 million square feet. There are 28 projects on contract of 8.3 million square feet that are ongoing and forthcoming are 1.7 million square feet.

Of the projects in Bangalore, Sharma said, “The company plans to build two hotels and a mall. The mall, Global Mall, of 3 mn sq ft has a hotel and the second, a hotel on St Mark’s Road. The cost and project details are being worked out.”

“We are also foraying into Mysore with a 400,000 sq ft mall and a villa project in Jattihundi,” he added.

Sobha Developers on Sunday launched Rs 260 crore high-end ‘Sobha Lifestyle’ project near the Bangalore International Airport at Devanahalli spread across 55 acres, with 165 villas on sites measuring 5,000 sq ft, 7,500 sq ft and 10,000 sq ft. “This project is a 60:40 joint development with Rennaissance Holdings of Bangalore,” said Sharma.