The Polish franchisee of KFC – Amrest – terminated the sale and purchase agreement concluded with Almira LLC and signed a new agreement with Smart Service, the franchisee said. LLC “Smart Service LTD” operated 41 KFC establishments in Izhevsk under a franchise. Owned by Konstantin Kotov and Andrey Oskolkov.
“Amrest terminated the sale and purchase agreement concluded with Almira LLC on December 6, 2022, and signed a new sale and purchase agreement with Smart Service on February 25, 2023, basically on the same terms of the agreement between Amrest and LLC” Almira, ”the message says.
The deal must be re-agreed by the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS). Amrest expects to receive at least €100 million from the sale of the business.
At the beginning of March 2022, the owner of the KFC brand, the American company Yum! Brands — against the backdrop of a special military operation in Ukraine, announced the suspension of investment and development in Russia, as well as the closure of its restaurants. Of the 1,000 open KFC locations in Russia (as of August 2021), Yum! Brands owned only 70 businesses, with the rest being franchised by its partners. One of the largest was the Polish holding Amrest – it owned 215 Russian KFC restaurants.
In March, Amrest followed Yum! Brands temporarily closed its Russian restaurants KFC and Pizza Hut (operated under a master franchise) and suspended operations in the Russian market.
At the end of February, the FAS approved the sale of KFC restaurants, which Amrest developed under the Yum! Brands, Almira company. The Mash telegram channel reported that the only Almira LLC that organizes catering is a counterparty of Voentorg and supplies food to military canteens. However, the press service of the antimonopoly department clarified RBC that we are talking about Almira LLC registered in Odintsovo near Moscow (engaged in renting and managing real estate). The company was founded in 2008, its sole founder, according to the Unified State Register of Legal Entities, is Oksana Mokaeva (Kanokova), a native of Nalchik.
Last October, Yum! Brands announced the sale of 70 restaurants and the KFC master franchise to the Russian franchisee Smart Service LTD LLC. Under the terms of the deal, the new owner must gradually rename all establishments to Rostic’s. In November, the FAS approved the deal.
Thus, Smart Service will receive a total of 326 restaurants.
