Wahaha Group to boost shopping center business

Hangzhou Wahaha Group, China's largest beverage group by sales, will continue to develop new shopping malls across the nation despite the current losses from its first.

"We're strongly confident in the domestic retail market, and we expect the revenue from our retail business to exceed that of our beverage business by 2015," Zong Qinghou, the founder and chairman of the company, said at a news conference held at the Beijing Grand Hyatt Hotel on Wednesday.

Last year, the group's revenue was 63.6 billion yuan ($10.4 billion), and Zong topped the Hurun Rich List in 2012 with a personal fortune estimated at $12.6 billion.