Major Japanese retailer Isetan Mitsukoshi Holdings Ltd. will shut down Isetan Bangkok, its 28-year-old department store in Thailand, in August, an Isetan Mitsukoshi official said Sunday without disclosing the reason for its closure.

Isetan (Thailand) Co., Isetan Mitsukoshi's subsidiary, will terminate a rental contract with a developer under the Thai conglomerate Central Group for the six-story store, which opened in April 1992 in the shopping complex now known as Central World, according to the official.

A new shopping outlet with a Japanese flavor will replace Isetan Bangkok around July to September in 2021, the local Bangkok Post newspaper reported Sunday, citing comments by a deputy CEO of Central Pattana Plc., the Central Group shopping center developer.

Central Pattana is renovating its shopping mall network with plans to increase its malls from the current 34 to 51 by 2024, according to the developer's financial statement released in February.

Isetan Bangkok expects sales of 4.2 billion yen ($39 million) and a net profit of 32 million yen for the fiscal year through March 2020, down around 10 percent and 60 percent respectively from the previous year, according to its financial statement.

Yet it maintained profitability throughout except for the fiscal year through March 2011, when it experienced temporary closure in 2010 due to antigovernment protests.

Japanese department stores in Bangkok are seeing mixed fortunes, as Takashimaya Co. opened one in November 2018, while Tokyu Department Store Co. closed its outlet in January 2019. (NNA/Kyodo)

==Kyodo

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