Latest Headlines – Page 183
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Safilo Gears Up For The Bourse On The Back Of Improved Results
The world's second-largest eyewear producer formally requested last month a listing on the Milan stock exchange, and a primary and secondary offering of shares in the group are now expected before the end of the year. According to the latest reports, Giorgio Armani and Bernard Arnault, whose licenses for the ...
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Ecca Bond Could Spell Trouble For Moulin
The prospectus filed for a bond issue launched by Eye Care Centers of America reveals that any sale of the bankrupt Moulin Global Eyecare Group's 56.5 percent share in the U.S. retail company would require it to immediately repay to JP Morgan Chase $165 million in senior debt and $152 ...
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Australian Challenger Goes Public
C@ ? pronounced «see at» ? hopes to raise 2.3-3.5 million Australian dollars (€1.4-2.2m-$1.7-2.6m) to set up a wholesale business for independent optical practices in Australia. The group plans to establish a wholesale production center in Perth, Western Australia, to supply frames, lenses and associated services to affiliates. The ...
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Luxottica Signs Up Burberry, Will Reshuffle Its Brand Portfolio
Luxottica Group is going to drop between two and four licenses as they expire over the next few months, and add new ones, in order to improve the quality of its brand portfolio. Unconfirmed speculation points to brands such as Polo Ralph Lauren and Puma as likely to join its ...
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Brand Reshuffling Also At L'amy, Charmant
L'Amy signed just before SILMO a global long-term eyewear license with Lanvin. The first products should be available next summer. Coupled with its previously announced Chloé license (see EWI of Oct. 5), the new deal should make up for the reorganization of the company's main license, Lacoste, which contributes to ...
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Polinelli Sells His Factories To Spy
Riccardo Polinelli, a busy entrepreneur in the Italian sunwear sector, has agreed to sell his contract manufacturing company, LEM, to its biggest customer, Spy Optic. Orange 21, the American company that owns Spy, says it will be paying €3.3 million in cash once the deal is closed sometime before Dec. ...
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After A Decent Third Quarter , Oakley Looks For Improvement In Europe
In the 3rd quarter ended Sept. 30, the company's net sales rose by 15.6 percent to $173.4 million, and net income climbed by 31.6 percent to $14, 969,000. The gross margin decreased to 53.5 percent, as compared to 55.5 percent in the same period last year, due in part to ...
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Essilor Accelerates Its Growth
Essilor has reported a strong 6.2 percent sales increase for the 3rd quarter on a comparable basis, up from the 4.7 percent growth rate recorded in the 1st half. For the full year, the company is expecting a currency-neutral sales increase of 8-9 percent. On a comparable basis, excluding the ...
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Hoya Vision Care Sell Its Instruments, Improves Margins
Hoya Vision Care further improved to 19.6 percent its operating margin in the quarter ended Sept. 30, compared with 17.4 percent in the year-ago period, as sales increased by 7.6 percent to 23.8 billion yen (€171.7m-$201.8m). The division's sales declined by 0.5 percent in Japan to 9.0 billion yen (€64.9m-$76.3m) ...
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Indo Launches Highly Customized Lenses
The Spanish company has begun to deliver the first customized progressive lenses based on a new «visual strategy» developed in-house to take into account all the parameters of the individual's field of vision and of his or her visual behavior. INDO describes its new technology, called Eyemade, as a more ...
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Fedon Considers New Diversification Avenues
Fedon is considering a possible new diversification, after its venture into leather accessories for the office and for travel. Among the new projects in the pipeline is the introduction of a line of display stands, called «Expoplay,» and of a highly innovative and patented system for personalizing any type of ...
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Bausch & Lomb Investigates Shady Dealings In Brazil
The company announced on Nov. 3 that it will delay the filing of its official 3rd quarter results because of a pending investigation into scandalous activity in Brazil. An independent probe launched by its board of directors revealed that executives of its Brazilian subsidiary, which generates roughly $20 million in ...
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Clearlab Has Sharply Higher Sales
ClearLab posted sales of $6 million in its 3rd quarter ended Oct. 1, up sharply from $1.9 million in the year-ago period. The international contact lens manufacturing company, based in the UK, had an operating loss of $1.4 million in the quarter, an improvement over an operating loss of $2.1 ...
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Advanced Medical Optics Reports Losses
Despite an increase in gross profit of 47 percent to $160.8 million in its 3rd quarter, Advanced Medical Optics posted a net loss of $31,200,000 in the period as compared to a loss of $31,700,000 in the year-ago quarter. Research and development costs associated with the recent acquisition of VISX, ...
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Satisloh Is Reorganizing Operations
The group that has emerged from the merger of Satis Vacuum and Loh is centralizing its logistics in Europe, in the USA and the Asia/Pacific market. A single platform will supply all the clients with all the equipment, spare parts, consumables and other products for coating and surfacing in each ...
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Nanotechnologies Make Eyewear More Competitive
The Italian eyewear industry has a new high-tech solution for boosting its competitiveness. Thanks to a €1.4 million research project supported by Italian state and regional authorities, national frame producers should be able in 3 years' time to use nanotechnologies instead of the traditional galvanization process to achieve a corrosion-proof ...
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Silmo Becomes More International
The number of foreign visitors grew by 6.7 percent at last month's SILMO show, as compared to a year ago, to represent 48.7 percent of the total attendance. With the number of French visitors down by 2.6 percent, possibly connected with the start of a round of school holidays, the ...
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Safilo Extends Armani And Gucci Deals, Goes Back To The Stock Exchange
More details are coming out about the long-expected initial public offering (IPO), which should finally take place on the Milan stock exchange at the end of 2005 or the beginning of 2006 . It is now expected to value Safilo at around €2 billion, nearly double its valuation when it ...
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Luxottica Makes Further Moves In China
Luxottica has announced the acquisition of another optical retail chain in China, turning the company into the leading player in this promising market, with a total of 278 stores in two of the three premium optical areas of the country ? Beijing and the Guandong province ? and in Hong ...
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Boots Merges With Alliance Unichem
Alliance UniChem, a public British company formed in 1997 through merger of UniChem in the UK and Alliance Santé in France, operates 939 pharmacies in the UK and 311 others in other European countries. The company also distributes pharmaceutical products to over 88,000 pharmacies, hospitals and health care centers throughout ...
