Future Park Rangsit to evolve into Future City
Rangsit Plaza Co, owned by the Wanglee family, will turn its 600-rai plot in Rangsit into a satellite town with an expected budget of 100 billion baht over the next 10 years.
The Future Park Rangsit shopping complex is currently located on the plot.
To be called Future City, the first phase is Future Park Rangsit, which already takes up 200 rai. The remaining 400 rai will be used to develop a hotel, residential condominiums, serviced apartments, office buildings, retail shops and other facilities.
Each new development zone will be handled by a different company under the parent Poonphol Group, said Rangsit Plaza chief executive Pimpaka Wanglee.
In 2016, the group will build a 200-room hotel in the same area of Future Park Rangsit. The hotel is in the process of an environmental impact assessment.
“We see opportunities for the hotel because Future Park customers are both local and foreign tourists,” Ms Pimpaka said. “The project is only seven kilometres from Don Mueang airport and can serve visitors to nearby destinations such as Ayutthaya.”
The new facility will augment Future Park Rangsit and fulfil customer needs.
Rangsit Plaza Co will set up a property fund to finance its future expansion. The property fund will be launched after the shopping mall’s new phase, Zpell, is open for two or three years.
Last Friday marked the official opening of Zpell@Future Park Rangsit under the “never regular” concept, bringing total space at Future Park Rangsit to 600,000 square metres and making it the country’s biggest retail complex.
The company spent 4 billion baht in developing Zpell to serve new markets and urban customers with high purchasing power.
At Zpell, 95% of retail space is booked. It houses 200 leading fashion shops and 40 restaurants, strengthening the status of Future Park Rangsit as the shopping centre of northern Bangkok. The entire Future Park Rangsit complex now has 1,200 retail shops.
Some 80% of shops and services at Zpell will be open in December before full operations start in January. Zpell is expected to boost the number of visitors to Future Park Rangsit to 200,000 a day from 150,000 now.
The company’s sales are expected to rise to 2.6 billion baht in 2016, up from 2 billion baht forecast this year.
In addition to Bangkok, Poonphol Group hopes to branch out to northeastern provinces linked to Laos and Cambodia to make the most of the coming Asean Economic Community.
The group is the country’s biggest modified starch maker. Its manufacturing base is in Chaiyaphum, Buri Ram and Nakhon Ratchasima.
The first of its mega retail projects upcountry will emerge within five years and require an investment of 3 billion baht for 100,000 sq m of space.