Latest Headlines – Page 231
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Rodenstock's Bid For Galileo Is Off
Rodenstock has not been able yet to make a formal offer, but its preliminary proposal to take over the whole Galileo group together with two local Italian entrepreneurs has been turned down. The German company, whose core business is shifting from ophthalmic instruments to lenses, had shown interest in acquiring ...
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Pro-laser Moves To Germany
Pro-Laser, the small Israeli high-tech company that bought a few weeks ago Weco and Rodenstock Instrumente, is moving its operational headquarters to Weco's main office in Düsseldorf to help speed up its own transformation into a global eye care company, focused on providing specific and turnkey lens manufacturing solutions and ...
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Zeiss Posts An Extraordinary Loss
One-time reorganization costs, writeoffs and provisions led the Carl Zeiss group to post a net loss of about 100 million DM (e 50m) in the year ended Sept. 30, but the management predicts a return to positive results in the current year. The group's operating income actually improved on a ...
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Grandvision Opens 1,000-sqm. Store
Grand Optical has renovated its Parisian megastore on the Champs-Elysées, expanding it to 1,000 square meters on 2 floors, which makes it probably the largest optical store in Europe. Designed by Gérard Barrau, it will serve as a prototype for other superstores that Grand Optical's parent company, GrandVision, plans to ...
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Nordic Buying Group Plans To Offer More Private Label Items, Including Lenses
Nordic Optical Partners, a consortium of buying groups that control an estimated 22-23 percent of the optical market in the Nordic countries, plans to approach suppliers in the course of 2000 to develop a common private brand of optical lenses, contact lenses and solutions that can be sourced by all ...
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Application Of The New European Nickel Directive To Eyewear Is Still In Doubt
By Jan. 20, 2000 all the member governments of the European Union must abide by Directive 94/27, which regulates the use of nickel in metal alloy products that come into contact with the skin, but its application to eyewear frames is not clear yet. The new European directive concerns ...
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Half-year Figures Confirm New Momentum For Italy's Exports
After a big slump in the first quarter, Italy's eyewear exports are on the way up again. The dramatic 12 percent shortfall that had been registered in the first 4 months of 1999 has been reduced to 9.5 percent for the first 7 months, thanks to a better performance in ...
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Italocremona Becomes Ic Optics, Licenses Benetton's Sports Eyewear
The Italian eyewear manufacturer has decided to give itself a new corporate identity, using the IC Optics trade name and logo to emphasize its concentration on the optical sector, following the recent acquisition of a 50 percent stake by the Gianni Versace fashion house in its own eyewear operations. Family ...
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Maui Jim Is Doubling European Sales
Maui Jim claims to be number three in the US sunglass market, after Ray-Ban and Oakley, but it's still small in Europe. Started up one and a half years ago, the US company's European operation sold about 15,000 pieces to about 200 clients with a total of about 600 shops ...
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Oakley Launches A Comprehensive Internet Strategy
The US sunglass and sports eyewear leader has announced a unique 4-channel strategy, using 4 different types of ?internet storefronts? to win over more customers for its diversified range of products, to raise customer awareness of the Oakley brand and to improve customer service. The company's corporate website, www.oakley.com, ...
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Loubsol's Club Med Promotion Looks Like A Win-win Proposition
Loubsol seems to have hit the jackpot with an ingenious promotion for its new licensed Club Mediterranée line of sunglasses, first launched at the Silmo fair in Paris one year ago. The licensor, the licensee, operators of independent optical stores and final consumers are all gaining something in the end ...
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Fielmann Expects Double-digit Growth
The leading European chain of optical stores is budgeting double-digit increases in sales and profits for 1999 as well as 2000 following an excellent third quarter and a planned acceleration in the domestic and foreign expansion of its store network. The number of new store openings should double next year ...
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General Optica Envisages Early 2000 Ipo
Certain investors are skeptical. Anyway, group officials confirm that the Italo-Spanish chain of optical shops, General Optica International, is working on a public offering on the Madrid stock exchange which should now take place next February or March, after several failed attempts that have been attributed to stockmarket conditions and ...
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Dollond & Aitchison Weighs On De Rigo, But Prada Is Its Next Hope
De Rigo will not provide profit or loss figures for the first 9 months of 1999. The sales results show the effect of the company's acquisition of Dollond & Aitchison and its investments in the 51 percent owned Ranieri Argentina and De Rigo Hellas distribution operations Group turnover jumped by ...
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Lenscrafers Chief Quits Luxottica
Luxottica reports the departure of one of its 7 board members, David Browne, who actually represented LensCrafters, the group's large US optical chain. Browne will also quit its operational functions, including responsibility for the group's commercial operations. No clear explanation could be obtained for Browne's resignation. Luxottica chief Leonardo ...
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Safilo Invests On Sunglasses
Safilo sees a big potential for expansion in sunglasses, which last year represented only 34 percent of its total turnover. The Italian firm wants to replicate in this sector the success it has enjoyed in sports eyewear, where it will reach a turnover of 100 billion Lire (e100m-$100m) this year ...
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Oakley Sues Safilo, Raids Counterfeiters, Controls Australian Distribution
The patent infringement suit launched by Oakley against Safilo America and its Smith Sport Optics subsidiary is similar to those still pending in US courts against Nike and against the Bausch & Lomb brands acquired by Luxottica last June - Ray-Ban, Reva, Killer Loop and Arnette - in relation to ...
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Bushnell's Parent Company Wants Bolle'
The majority shareholders of Bollé have signed a definitive agreement to sell the sports and street eyewear company to Worldwide Sports & Recreation, a private company that owns the Bushnell and Voit brands. WSR plans to run Bollé as a separate, stand-alone company, but with major synergies in warehousing and ...
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Essilor Grows By 5.8% In The Third Quarter
France, the rest of Europe, North America, South America and Asia all contributed to the 5.8 percent increase in Essilor's turnover, on a comparable basis, in the 3rd quarter ended Sept. 30. It's a better score than the 2.8 percent increase of the 1st half of the year, and it ...
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Foreign Attendance At Silmo Is Up 7.9%
SILMO, now by far the world's largest eyewear fair at this time of the year, is becoming more international. The number of visitors from outside France at the Oct. 23-25 session of the Paris show reached 9,884, or 7.9 percent more than a year ago, with double-digit increases from outside ...
