France’s Auchan Group announced last week that it plans open its first hypermarket in Kyiv by January 2008. As part of its Ukraine plans Auchan will open another three hypermarkets with 14 ths square meters of retail space each later. Auchan is the fourth foreign retailer to announce plans to enter Ukraine this year, Germany’s Real, and Russia’s O’kei and Mosmart have all announced plans to open stores in Ukraine. Additionally, last week System Capital Management (SCM) announced that it was creating a new company, Ukrainian Retail, for investment in business projects in the Ukrainian retail market.