HCM City will be home to the first outlet, with store numbers in the country targeted at 100 in three years and 1,000 over a decade. — Illustrative image/ Photo insideretail.com.au

TOKYO (Biz Hub) — Seven & i Holdings plans to open its first 7-Eleven outlet in Viet Nam in 2017, bringing its expertise in running Japan's most successful convenience store chain to the Southeast Asian country.

US subsidiary 7-Eleven and IFB Holdings, which runs the Subway sandwich chain and other eateries in Viet Nam, recently signed a licensing agreement. HCM City will be home to the first outlet, with store numbers in the country targeted at 100 in three years and 1,000 over a decade.

Even though most overseas 7-Eleven stores are managed by the US subsidiary, Seven & i Holdings seeks to expand in Vietnam by applying a business model cultivated at home. Seven-Eleven Japan, the No. 1 player in Japan's convenience store market, will dispatch four employees to Viet Nam to help local staffers develop unique products, such as lunch and prepared foods, and choose store locations.

Seven & i Holdings will also help develop a distribution network that enables shipping of products at optimal temperatures.

There are about 38,000 7-Eleven stores outside Japan, including in Southeast Asian nations such as Thailand, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Indonesia.

A country with about 92.5 million people, Viet Nam's economy is booming, but convenience stores are still largely confined to HCM City, which has only about 400. Two other Japanese chains were in operation as of the end of February, FamilyMart with 71 stores and Ministop with 17. — Nikkei

See more at http://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Companies/7-Eleven-coming-to-Vietnam-in-2017