IC Companys posts profit jump

Danish fashion group IC Companys on Thursday posted a sharp rise in first half pre-tax profit to 8.7 million USD from 6.1 million USD in the year-ago period. The company, which sells its apparel throughout Scandinavia and western Europe, said in a statement turnover for the six months to December fell to 206 million USD from 212 million USD in 2001.

IC Companys A/S is a Danish public limited company created through the merger of Carli Gry International A/S and InWear Group A/S on 30 April 2001. The company designs and sells a strong product portfolio of clothing targeting quality-conscious women and men all over the world under the brands of Jackpot, Cottonfield, InWear, Matinique, Part Two and many more.

IC Companys has 284 company-owned shops in 18 countries and 25 factory outlets in 13 countries. The number of outlets was approximately 7,600, of which some 500 are third-party concept stores.IC Companys has approximately 2,096 employees. Subsidiaries are located throughout most of Europe, in Canada and in Hong Kong.

www.iccompanys.com
March 4, 2003

Malene Birger sets up new fashion company

IC Companys signed an agreement on Tuesday with Danish designer Malene Birger to acquire fifty one per cent of the shares in a new fashion company. Birger is the creator of successful clothing brands as Jackpot, Cottonfield and Matinque. The new company, named By Malene Birger, will develop a new classically styled clothing brand, primarily for women, to express the highly personal style for which Malene Birger is known. A bohemian, classical style for women, sophisticated and sexy design with an edge.

It’s a dream come true for Malene Birger. “I have wanted to set up a company of my own for a long time, so I’m quite pleased that I’m now able to do so with a strong financial partner such as IC Companys,” she said. The new headquarters of By Malene Birger will be positioned in the beautiful and historic 600-square-metre “Kings Brewhouse” in Copenhagen.

The company will start operations in February 2003, and the first new Malene Birger collection will be at the fairs in August 2003. In addition to the Spring/Summer 2004 collection, the company’s here-and-now products are expected to be marketed for delivery as early as September 2003.

Underwear and men’s collections are planned for launch in early 2004.

January 8, 2003
www.iccompanys.com

IC Companys acquires Saint Tropez

Saint Tropez, a popular fashion brand for young women, will now have the basis for increased international growth.

In line with the IC Companys strategy, which was developed as part of the merger between Carli Gry and InWear, the Board of Directors has decided to purchase 100% of the equity in the Danish brandname clothing company, Saint Tropez of 1993 A/S.

“The acquisition of Saint Tropez, which appeals mainly to younger women, means we are bringing a particularly strong brand into our family,” says Anders Høiris, Deputy CEO of IC Companys. “Saint Tropez has a great international potential which we can realize through our close network in Europe, which covers some 300 stores.”

Today, Saint Tropez has 10 stores in Denmark, and is represented in Finland, Holland, Ireland, Norway and Sweden. It will continue as an
independent unit of the IC Companys group, and its founder, Niels Henrik Henriksen, will continue as its CEO.

“We have grown to a size where increased internationalization is a necessary – and natural – path to further expansion. IC Companys was able to offer the best conceivable international platform,” says Henriksen. “And when IC Companys’ management decided to let Saint Tropez continue as an independent company, it wasn’t hard to make a decision. There is broad agreement between our and IC Companys’ plans and ideas, so I fully expect to see a harmonious working relationship, both on a practical and emotional level.”

Saint Tropez has 42 full-time employees and had gross earnings in fiscal year 2000/2001 of DKK 35 million (EUR 4.7 million).

Caption: Saint Tropez appeals to more and more of today’s young women.

www.iccompanys.com
1-3-2002

Carli Gry and InWear announce plans to merge: IC Companys A/S
- a new, leading brand name entity in Europe's clothing industry Europe's consumers already buy annually over 18 million pieces of garments un-der the brand names that henceforth will form the IC Company A/S' product range Within the next few years Cottonfield, InWear, Jackpot, Matinique, Part Two and Peak Performance will be in the forefront in more than 6,000 modern clothing stores throughout Europe.

At the same time, every major city in Europe will boast super-modern IC Companys chain stores with the focus on the company's six well-known brands, together with a number of new brands. The cornerstone for this development has been laid with the merger of Carli Gry and InWear. The two companies' range of brand name clothing is already sold in almost 5,000 shops all across Europe. In addition, Carli Gry and InWear together own and operate over 280 own-name stores in 17 countries and enjoy close collaboration with more than 400 concept stores which focus exclusively on the IC Companys' brand names.

"Consumers demand a choice. They want the well-known brand names, but they are no longer blindly faithful to any one brand name. They want to be able to put together their own wardrobe with a range of different brand names. IC Companys is now offer-ing this opportunity by bringing together all its well-known - and new - brands," ex-plains Anders Høiris, managing director of Carli Gry. Behind the scenes, the merger offers significant efficiency improvement potential. For instance, each year the two companies despatch almost 800,000 cartons of clothing to destinations throughout Europe - many of them to the same cities and regions.

"We will achieve a significant increase in profitability through rationalisation. But equally important, we can now pool our entire wealth of ideas, creativity and design. We will channel this tremendous developmental strength into special brand name di-visions, where the focus will be on developing each one of our major brands," adds Lars Kjær, managing director of InWear.

IC Companys A/S will be amongst Europe's leading clothing companies, with a first-year turnover in excess of DKK 3.3 billion. The boards of directors of the two companies have formally recommended the merger and proposed that managing director Steen Rasborg be appointed Chairman of the Board, Lars Nørby Johansen be appointed Deputy Chairman of the Board of IC Com-panys A/S, and that the board of management comprise Lars Kjær (CEO) and Anders Høiris (Deputy CEO).

Final approval of the merger is expected to be given at the gen-eral meetings of the two companies, to be held on 30 April 2001.