Sarawak (Malaysia) restaurant chain SCR Corp is set to move into Indonesia, first targeting Pontianak in Borneo as well as Jakarta.

GM (franchising and strategic planning) Johnny Leo Lee Boon says the company is ready to launch its franchise business once potential partners have secured prime locations in the two cities. He says business groups from Pontianak and Jakarta have visited Sarawak several times to study the chain’s franchise business model.

“They have come up with proposed secondary locations to set up SCR restaurants that we find may not be ideal,” he says. “We advise them to look for strategic prime locations where there are good daily crowds… The ball now is in their court.”

Leo says Jakarta has more than 70 malls that are ideal for F&B, while Pontianak with its population of about 1.6 million people could also support the franchise.

SCR, which celebrates its 30th anniversary next year, owns 36 restaurants and has 19 franchised outlets in Sarawak, Sabah, Labuan and Brunei. Fourteen of the owned outlets and five franchises are in Kuching. The menu features 110 local and western dishes and beverages, with Singapore chicken rice the signature dish.

Leo says SCR is also in preliminary talks with a company in the Philippines about franchising, and its executives are expected to visit soon.

Meanwhile, SCR will soon open its first franchise outlet in Lawas, northern Sarawak, and there are expansion plans to to Kapit once the road link is ready.

“The food business market in Sarawak is saturated,” says Leo. “We are consolidating and limiting the number of outlets in certain towns. Our focus is to expand our franchise business to more countries in Asean.”