Versace: Choose Top PE + "China Brand"

In the Greek mythology, LOGO, the fashion luxury brand Versace (Versace), is more smart in choosing investors than Italy counterparts Prada, hoping to have both fish and bear paws. In March 2014, the world's largest alternative Asset Management Co Blackstone Group (Blackstone) bought Versace's 20% stake by 210 million euros after several rounds of intense bidding.

As early as 2012, Versace hired Goldman Sachs and INTESA SANPAOLO of Italy as a financial consultant to help investors find the way to expand the global market by selling minority interest to private investors, especially in the expansion of Asia's and Latin American market expansion networks, which are very powerful in St Paul.

In the bidding, Blackstone hit the "China card" - emphasizing the background of shareholders of China's sovereign investment fund (CIC), giving it to Versace.

The development and network construction bring advantages.

We plan to increase the number of Direct stores to 200 in 3 years, especially in emerging markets.

The company CEO Gian Giacomo Ferraris said that compared with the mature market, the Asia Pacific region is high-end.

The demand is growing day by day.

Versace has plans for listing in the next 3-5 years, hoping that Blackstone's investment will help them achieve this goal.

For luxury brands, equity funds play the role of financial partners: the famous PE professional post team can help brands solve the problems of capital and operation, so that the original family or management team can focus on creativity and quality.

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Due to the slowdown in the global luxury industry, M & A has become an important part of the development strategy of the whole industry.

Some luxury goods groups are considering selling less lucrative brand units, introducing more fashionable luxury brands, watches and leather goods.

In recent years, the famous strategic mergers and acquisitions in the industry include LVMH buying Italy jeweler Bvlgari (Bvlgari), and Labelux group buying famous women shoes brand Jimmy Choo.

Independent luxury brands such as Italy Armani (Armani) and France Chanel (Chanel) are most likely to become the next prey in the M & a market: these companies are not like LVMH and Richemont, which can spread risks to multiple brands and thus suffer short term market shocks.

After the debt crisis in Europe and America in 2008, some buyers in Asia and the Middle East also began to emerge in the field of international luxury acquisition.

Asia has become the world's largest luxury market in recent years, mainly due to the rapid rise of consumption power in the mainland of China.

Although some Chinese fashion apparel entrepreneurs and local investment institutions are interested in investing in international luxury brands, luxury goods industry is not simple.

"Money is capricious" has proved to be unsuitable in cross-border mergers and acquisitions, especially in luxury brands.

First of all, although China has become the second largest economy in the world, it is still far inferior to the developed countries in Europe and the United States in terms of public image, design level, quality and intellectual property protection.

Second, the head of the European luxury family, even considering selling shares with potential investors, does not like public auctions, and usually only contacts privately selected buyers.

Chinese buyers can hardly squeeze into the small circle of luxury industry mergers and acquisitions.

Third, the great difference between China and Europe and America in terms of culture and concept is also a major obstacle for Chinese buyers to buy luxury brands.

In addition, although many luxury brands are heavily indebted due to cost control and other problems, even if the business is in trouble, these companies are reluctant to reduce costs and cut costs.

For Chinese companies and investors, there are few financial strength and operational experience to bring the struggling brand back to life.