GERRY WEBER ACQUIRES HALLHUBER

Funds advised by Change Capital Partners (Change Capital), the specialist pan-European private equity fund investing in retail and consumer businesses, today (22 December) sold their 100% interest in Munichbased Hallhuber Beteiligungs to Gerry Weber International.

Terms of the transaction were not mentioned. Consummation of the transaction is subject to antitrust approval in Germany and Austria.

Change Capital acquired Hallhuber from Italian fashion company Stefanel in 2009 and during its ownership, transformed the company with a new management team to become the preferred womenswear brand for fashion conscious, modern women in Germany and across Europe, doubling its sales and tripling its profits.

Change Capital laid the foundations for Hallhuber’s success by creating a new management team and devising a business transformation programme, which produced significant improvements across all key areas including store concept, product merchandising, display, and selling. As a result, Hallhuber is well placed to respond to changes in fashion styles and trends with high quality, contemporary and stylish products.

Hallhuber has increased its retail network from under 100 points of sales to 219 and has expanded into a number of new European markets. Today, Hallhuber has points of sale in Germany, Austria, Belgium, the UK, Switzerland and the Netherlands. Hallhuber fashion can also be bought via online platforms in Germany, Austria, France, Switzerland and the UK. Under Change Capital’s ownership Hallhuber has expanded its workforce by more than 500.

Stephan Lobmeyr, Partner of Change Capital Partners, commented: “When we acquired Hallhuber it was an undermanaged brand that was underinvested and performing below its full potential. There was a compelling opportunity to transform the business through restructuring its existing operations, expanding its store network and launch an ecommerce platform. We thank Norbert
Steinke, Richard Lohner, Susanne Hallhuber and the entire team for transforming this vision into reality. We are proud of their achievements and are convinced that the next chapter in Hallhuber’s history will be just as successful.”

Dr. David Frink, Chief Financial Officer and Speaker of the Management Board of Gerry Weber International commented: “The Hallhuber brands are complementary to our existing Gerry Weber brands, they operate a completely vertical business model and they are ready to move into new European markets. Hallhuber is looking at enormous sales and profit growth potential and its options for further development have barely been tapped. Now we have to work together to make the most of these options.”

Chief Sales Officer Ralf Weber, the Managing Board member in charge of sales and company development throughout the Gerry Weber Group, said: “The Gerry Weber Group already has its own retail spaces in almost all European countries. We will team up with Hallhuber as partners in a professional way in order to support them in building their own network of companymanaged retail
spaces especially outside Germany. These efforts will benefit from our accumulated expertise and our existing structures.”

Norbert Steinke, CEO of Hallhuber said: “After exciting five years with Change Capital Partners we look forward to entering a new chapter with Gerry Weber. I wish to thank all our employees for their considerable achievements over the past years. We are excited by the prospect of entering the next stage of growth.”

Change Capital was advised by EKAPARTNERS, Leonardo & Co. and Weil, Gotshal & Manges.