All Corporate articles – Page 16

  • News briefs

    CooperVision has acquired Blanchard Contact Lenses, a fast-growing scleral lens...

    2019-01-23T00:00:00Z

    CooperVision has acquired Blanchard Contact Lenses, a fast-growing scleral lens company. Founded in 1986, Blanchard has operations in Sherbrooke, Quebec, and Manchester, New Hampshire, employing about 70 people. It will retain its name and continue to operate as a separate organization. Blanchard, thanks to a network of distributors, claims to ...

  • News briefs

    More than 45,000 Essilor employees in 58 countries, or about...

    2019-01-23T00:00:00Z

    More than 45,000 Essilor employees in 58 countries, or about 65 percent of the company's total staff, owned shares in the newly formed EssilorLuxottica group at the end of last year. Together, they now own a little more than 4 percent of its equity. This compares with about 35,000 employees ...

  • News briefs

    Safilo has inaugurated a nickel-free production line with a daily...

    2018-12-27T00:00:00Z

    Safilo has inaugurated a nickel-free production line with a daily capacity of 20,000 units. The line is part of a €5 million investment package, spread over two years, of its Longarone manufacturing site in Northern Italy that specializes in metal frames. Other investments include a water treatment system. The ...

  • News briefs

    One Click Ventures, an e-tailer that sells prescription and non-prescription...

    2018-12-27T00:00:00Z

    One Click Ventures, an e-tailer that sells prescription and non-prescription glasses online, has been acquired by FGX International, a division of EssilorLuxottica, for an undisclosed amount. The transaction was publicly announced on Dec. 4, although it was closed in the third quarter of 2018. One Click's brands include felix + ...

  • News briefs

    EssilorLuxottica's executive chairman, Leonardo Del Vecchio, said that he calls...

    2018-12-27T00:00:00Z

    EssilorLuxottica's executive chairman, Leonardo Del Vecchio, said that he calls the new company Essilux to shorten its name. An international trade magazine, Optical World, has been calling it Luxilor, even before its final creation. We like Del Vecchio's abbreviation. Essilor and Luxottica merged on Oct. 1.

  • News briefs

    L Catterton Asia and Mitsui & Co. Principal Investments (MCPI)...

    2018-12-27T00:00:00Z

    L Catterton Asia and Mitsui & Co. Principal Investments (MCPI) have jointly acquired a stake in Owndays, a Japanese eyewear manufacturer and retailer with operations all over the Asia-Pacific region. The investment fund is joining other shareholders including members of Owndays' management led by Shuji Tanaka, who took over the ...

  • News briefs

    Hans Anders has acquired the Eyes + More chain of...

    2018-12-27T00:00:00Z

    Hans Anders has acquired the Eyes + More chain of optical retail stores for €60 million, expanding its reach in the value-for -money segment in Northern Europe. Eyes + More has 170 stores of which 119 are located in Germany, 33 in the Netherlands, 10 in Belgium and 8 in ...

  • News briefs

    Safilo is planning to upgrade in 2021 its U.S. distribution...

    2018-12-27T00:00:00Z

    Safilo is planning to upgrade in 2021 its U.S. distribution center in Denver, Colorado with the automation of the “order-to-cash” procedure, a transition that caused significant disruption at the Padua center at the beginning of 2017. Safilo pointed out that the Denver site is less automated than Padua, reducing execution ...

  • News briefs

    As of Dec. 12, Luxottica's shareholdings had tendered 93.30 percent...

    2018-12-27T00:00:00Z

    As of Dec. 12, Luxottica's shareholdings had tendered 93.30 percent of their shares to the newly formed EssilorLuxottica group, triggering a squeeze-out procedure under which it will purchase all the remaining shares by Jan. 18, 2019 at the latest. Luxottica's de-listing from the Italian stock exchange is set to become ...

  • News briefs

    This month, Luxottica is renting Villa Reale in Monza, north...

    2018-11-05T00:00:00Z

    This month, Luxottica is renting Villa Reale in Monza, north of Milan, for its Luxottica Days, during which the company will display its 2019 collections to buyers. During the period, Villa Reale will be off limits for tourists, including its royal apartments, causing some controversy. But the mayor of Monza, ...

  • News briefs

    Mister Spex has postponed its initial public offering. Three years...

    2018-11-05T00:00:00Z

    Mister Spex has postponed its initial public offering. Three years ago, Mister Spex announced that it would go public by the end of this year. Goldman Sachs acquired one-fifth of Mister Spex's shares in January 2015. So far, the German eyewear retailer had collected €80 million from investors and employed ...

  • News briefs

    The Tabacchi family has increased its stake in Perini Navi,...

    2018-11-05T00:00:00Z

    The Tabacchi family has increased its stake in Perini Navi, a major Italian builder of yachts, from 49.99 percent to 75 percent. The Tabacchis were previously shareholders in Safilo and Salmoiraghi & Viganò. Edoardo Tabacchi is currently vice-president of Perini Navi.

  • News briefs

    Mark'ennovy, the European producer of contact lenses, secured debt and...

    2018-11-05T00:00:00Z

    Mark'ennovy, the European producer of contact lenses, secured debt and equity funding from two new investors in September. Bond Capital Partners, a London-based investment and advisory firm for SMEs, has acquired a substantial stake in the company, while Alantra, a global investment bank and asset manager, is helping to finance ...

  • Short stops

    Vista Outdoor has announced the completion of the sale of...

    2018-09-27T00:00:00Z

    Vista Outdoor has announced the completion of the sale of its Bolle, Cebe and Serengeti brands for gross proceeds of $158 million

  • News briefs

    Alcon, the eye care business of Novartis, has announced plans...

    2018-09-27T00:00:00Z

    Alcon, the eye care business of Novartis, has announced plans to locate its future global headquarters in Geneva once its proposed spinoff from Novartis International is complete. The Swiss group decided to cut ties with Alcon in July, to focus on its portfolio of pharmaceutical products (see Eyewear Intelligence, Vol. ...

  • News briefs

    Waldo, a London-based brand of daily contact lenses sold online,...

    2018-08-31T00:00:00Z

    Waldo, a London-based brand of daily contact lenses sold online, has secured a £5 million (€5.6m-$6.5m) in additional funding from various financial investors to accelerate its international expansion. It went through an initial £1.3 million (€1.4m-$1.7m) financing round last year when the company was created by Ashleigh Hinde, a 29-year ...

  • News briefs

    As a first step in its divestiture plan, earlier this...

    2018-07-31T00:00:00Z

    As a first step in its divestiture plan, earlier this month Vista Outdoor sold its Bollé, Cébé and Serengeti brands of sunglasses to Antelope Brands Bidco, an entity affiliated with an American private equity fund, A&M Capital Partners, which recently opened a branch in London. The transaction was closed for ...

  • News briefs

    Sherpa Capital, the private investment fund that took over Indo...

    2018-07-31T00:00:00Z

    Sherpa Capital, the private investment fund that took over Indo in 2016, has sold a majority stake in the Spanish lens manufacturer to another fund, Ergon Capital Partners. Based in Brussels with offices in France, Italy, Germany and Spain, Ergon describes itself as a mid-market private equity investment company managing ...

  • News briefs

    Cab9 Eyewear, a French company formed by a team of...

    2018-07-31T00:00:00Z

    Cab9 Eyewear, a French company formed by a team of snowboard instructors, has raised a total of €10,649 from 167 contributors through Kickstarter to fund the production of its new action sports sunglass, called the Edge. Based in the French alpine ski resort of Méribel, Cab9 has been turning out ...

  • News briefs

    Glorify Unbreakable signed up its 1,000th “business rebel” in early...

    2018-07-31T00:00:00Z

    Glorify Unbreakable signed up its 1,000th “business rebel” in early June as part of a crowd-funding campaign to help launch the Austrian sports and outdoor eyewear more deeply into the international market. Through the campaign, which kicked off in September 2017, the company's inventor and business owner, Christian Egger, was ...