New Look Sells Shares To Private Equity

The three quarter results of New Look Group Ltd. released in early February showed that the group's revenue fell 1.6% to 399 million 900 thousand pounds in the three quarter to December 27, 2014. The group attributed the decline in sales to the unusual warm weather in autumn, which dragged down the performance of most European apparel retailers during the quarter.

Same store sales fell by 1.7%, of which 1% in the same store sales in the UK, while 28.6% in e-commerce sales.

Core earnings decreased by 2.7% to 76 million 800 thousand pounds.

In the first nine months ended December 27th, the group's core profit was 192 million 600 thousand, an annual increase of 3.4%.

The largest shareholder of Brait SE is the 73 year old retail giant Christo Wiese, which accounts for 35% of the shares.

In recent years, he has been active in the M & A activities of the British retail industry. He once bid for BHS, a chain store group of Philip Green, a British retail tycoon. It is also joining the Andy Bond of the ASDA Group Limited of the British supermarket chain group to create a similar Primark Primark fashion dress retailer Pep & Co., which is basically coincident with the business of the company.

New Look Group Ltd., the UK's high street brand, has agreed to sell 90% stake to Brait SE (JSE:BAT), a private Holdings Company in South Africa, at 780 million pounds, which means that two private Holdings Company, New, Look Group Ltd., 30.1%, respectively, have withdrawn altogether, while the founder and family management of the company are selling some of their shares respectively. After the completion of the paction, their shareholding ratio will be reduced to 10%.

Plus the current 1 billion pound debt scale, the deal gives New Look Group Ltd. 1 billion 900 million pounds valuation.

At the beginning of this year, Apax Partners LLP and Permira Advisers LLP, who had held New Look Group Ltd. for 11 years, were eager to divest their funds, seeking to sell a few or even controlling shares with Goldman Sachs (Goldman Sachs) Goldman Sachs (Goldman Sachs) for the past year. Last year, they also said that the chief executive of the group would not merge with the preparatory group before the fall of 2015.

The sale of New Look Group Ltd. has even attracted the attention of Chinese capital.

The Sunday Times quoted the news at the end of April as saying that Fosun International Ltd (0656.HK) joint CDH investment and CITIC Capital had held preliminary talks on the acquisition of New Look Group Ltd. and Apax Partners LLP and Permira Advisers LLP.

New Look Group Ltd. originally planned to hold an analyst meeting on IPO today, but it has now been cancelled.

New Look Group Ltd. is the second British asset acquired by Brait SE within a month. In April, Brait SE SE bought 682 million of the 80% Virgin interest in the fitness club of Virgin Group.

Brait SE announced in today's announcement that New Look Group Ltd. has attracted investment factors, including the continuous core earnings in recent years, double-digit growth of EBITDA, double-digit growth, robust cash flow, the leading position in the UK apparel market, strong growth prospects in France, Germany, and especially in China and other international markets, and traditional stores and e-commerce.

The mature development and the scale and efficiency of its fast fashion business mode.

Brait SE cites data from Kantar Worldpanel, which points out that New Look is the highest brand in the UK in the first 24 weeks to March 2015, and has the highest market in the UK under the age of 25 and 9-15 years old.

In the whole British women's clothing market, the market share of the brand is second.

At present, New Look Group Ltd. has set up 809 stores worldwide, including 569 direct outlets in the UK, 135 direct outlets in China, France, Poland, Ireland and Belgium, and 135 counters in Germany and Holland, and 105 franchises in the Middle East, South Africa, Europe and other parts of Asia.

China is an overseas market focused by the group.

The brand plans to deploy 70 Chinese stores before the end of the next fiscal year (June 2016), making China the second largest market in the group (counting the number of stores).

At present, the brand has online stores on the Tmall mall platform of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. (NYSE:BABA) Alibaba, and has opened 18 entity stores.

The group ended its operations in Russia and Ukraine.

In the spring of 2013,

Group Ltd. has launched the China 100 store program. In January of that year, it became the Group CEO's Anders Kristiansen with many years of Chinese market experience. Before that, he served as vice president of the group of Bestseller Fashion Group, the two parent of Vero Moda and Jack & Jones JACK&JONES.

New Look Group Ltd. was privatized in 2004 by Apax Partners LLP and Permira Advisers LLP joint Tom Advisers at 800 million pounds. Two private Holdings Company accounted for 30.1% of the shares, while the management group maintained 23.3% and 13.4% respectively.

The group planned to return to the open market in 2010, but was later cancelled due to financial turmoil.