IKEA, the Swedish company, will be building a 300-room hotel in Khimki near Moscow, reports Traveldailynews (ЕВТ), an international news agency. The construction will begin this year and the completion of the works is planned for 2010. The new hotel will be run by the Swedish Scandic.  

The hotel will be built in the local business park with the largest in Russia commercial centre including 250 shops and restaurants, all run by IKEA.    

According to EBT , Mr Per Kaufmann,  Director General of  IKEA s Russian branch,  pointed out that a lot of worlds leading hotel chains have already come to Russia, however their target is the expensive high class segment, while Scandic will focus on the middle class.    According to Liubov Shiyan, Deputy Director General of Imperial Hotel Spa in Moscow, if the hotel actually meets the declared requirements it will fill a practically vacant market niche in the Russian hotel business. However, the record of 4-star hotel construction by foreign companies in Moscow testifies to the contrary, L. Shiyan remarked.I mean - she added that at first international chains, like Holiday Inn, for example, announce building a 4 star hotel, but then they put up the prices which are at a 5 star level and even higher.  

Scandic is one of the leading players in the hotel market of Northern Europe. The Company owns and operates nearly 130 town and business 4-star hotels in Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Germany, Belgium, as well as in Estonia and Lithuania.   In 2002-2006 Scandic belonged to the Hilton network but early in 2007 it was acquired by EQT, a private Company, engaged in  real estate business in Northern Europe and China.