Essar Group’s The Mobile Store (TMS) today signed an agreement with Impact Retail to acquire the latter’s consumer durables and IT (CDIT) operations branded as X-Cite.

X-Cite presently has collective retail space of 95,000 sq.ft across 7 stores in cities including Delhi, Gurgaon, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Pune & Ahmedabad.

TMS says that the acquisition allows it to enhance its offering to consumers and now also provide consumer durables and IT products in addition to its telecom handsets and services offering. TMs says it has devised its strategy on four aspects, providing a superior in-store customer service, offering differentiated service products, better consumer offers and leveraging existing customer base.

Sharing his views, Rajiv Agarwal, CEO and Director, The MobileStore, says, "This acquisition represents a major milestone in our journey. Our intention is to quickly jump start and launch the retail venture into the consumer durable & IT business and provide a more comprehensive offering to our customers. Further we wanted a player who has a good understanding of the CDIT business and X-Cite has emerged as a serious player. Our plan is to continue the business from the current 7 stores and plug in gaps in key markets like Mumbai, Kolkatta and Chennai.”

Impact Retail CEO, Srikant Gokhale adds, “We are excited about now being a part of TMS, which is best poised to leverage and take our business to the next stage with its scale of operation and its strength of consumer marketing.”