CRE will own 80 per cent of the new business, and Tesco, which is investing 345 million pounds ($577 million) in it, will hold 20 per cent. The British supermarket will also have two seats on a board with a maximum of 10 members. The companies hope to benefit from Tesco's expert knowledge of retail best practices, including customer analytics and supply chain management, and CRE's infrastructure and knowledge of the local market. They are expecting sales of around 10 billion pounds. Britain's biggest retailer has faced significant problems in establishing itself in some of the world's largest markets. Last year it was forced to sell its Fresh & Easy chain in the United States after a 1-billion-pound writedown. It also made an expensive exit from Japan two years ago, after spending a decade trying to crack the market. But Tesco has remained keen to establish a firmer foothold in China, with its 1.4-billion-strong population, describing it as a "strategically important growth market" on its website.