Jollibee eyes first store in Japan by 2019

Homegrown fast food giant Jollibee Foods Corp. (JFC) is eyeing its first store in Japan by 2019 to cater to the potential influx of overseas Filipino workers there.

"Hopefully we can open by 2019," JFC Chairman Tony Tan Caktiong told reporters on the sidelines of the company's annual stockholders' meeting in Pasig City.

"We were told that Japan will welcome Filipino caregivers... Japan has about 45 million seniors that need special care by nurses or caregivers," he added.

For this year or by early next year, the company is looking at opening stores in Toronto, Canada; upscale Manhattan, New York City as well as in Australia and Guam, he added.

"So we are very excited with this," he said.

The plan to add more stores overseas is part of JFC's plan to have a network of 4,000 stores across the globe.

For his part, JFC Chief Finance Officer Ysmael Baysa said that the company is targeting to open 350 stores this year, 250 in the Philippines and 100 outside the country.

"We have a capital expenditure of P14.7 billion, this the highest CAPEX in our history. The P9 billion is for store expansion and the P5 billion is for commissaries," Baysa said

JFC ended 2016 with 3,555 stores globally. —JST/KVD, GMA News