Ducati Sporting Club UK > General > Idle Chat > Benetton family buys stake in Ducati?????

[AK]

Found this:-

"Andrew Dewson

24 Aug 2005

Texas Pacific Group is to sell its 33.5% stake in Italian motorcycle manufacturer Ducati Motor Holding to Investindustrial, an Italian private equity group with backing from Alessandro Benetton, whose family is among Italy's wealthiest.



The Italian weekly Mercati Finanza reports that Investindustrial beat several other parties to win the stake. Chief executive Federico Minoli will remain in charge of the company.


Minoli told Italian reporters last month that Texas Pacific was talking to "four or five" parties about buying the stake.


US-based Texas Pacific bought the stake in 1996 for a reported $100m (€82m) in equity plus $200m in debt, making it one of the Fort Worth-based buy-out firm's lengthiest investments.


Like many of Texas Pacific's investments, Ducati was struggling against bankruptcy at the time.


The stake was worth €60m ($73.3m), or €1.15 per share at the close of trading on the Milan Stock Exchange yesterday, just over a third of its value when the company floated in 1999 at €2.90 per share.


Ducati refinanced debt earlier this year, repaying a mature bond with a €100m syndicated loan.


Last year it reported a net loss of €7.8m, compared to breaking even in 2003. It blamed the loss on a delayed arrival of new bike models. Minoli said last month it was expected to break even this year.


Investindustrial, run by Andrew Bonomi, manages over €600m of private equity investments across France, Spain and Italy. Its investments have included satellite operator Eutelsat and construction groups Permasteelisa and Sirti. Ducati will be its first motoring acquisition.


Separately, Gate Gourmet, the Texas Pacific-owned airline catering company whose UK arm was threatened with administration, was yesterday thrown a lifeline by its main customer, British Airways. The airline offered an improved contract on the condition that a strike involving Gate Gourmet's workers was called off"

C

[Ray]

TPG have been trying to get out of Ducati for a while, I didn't know they were involved with Gate Gourmet (SIC)

Looks like Ducati might be the least of their worries then

Ray

[ziggi]

That doesn't make great reading from an economic view point. Ducati make some of the worlds finest motorcycles, has one of the worlds sexiest brands and can only break even or make 7M euro loss! What's going on?

[guest1]

Originally posted by ziggi
That doesn't make great reading from an economic view point. Ducati make some of the worlds finest motorcycles, has one of the worlds sexiest brands and can only break even or make 7M euro loss! What's going on?

As with lots of things, it makes good news to report the extremes.
If you check out the financial reports as presented to Ducati board then you get the bigger reported picture. If you're into that sort of thing it's easy to find on the Ducati portal.
The reports are somewhat different to those currently in the news.

[Edited on 24-8-2005 by guest1]

[chicken]

Remember that TPG bought in at Ducati's most recent zenith - the 916 was the most lusted after consumer product in the world, the naked sportsbike category was created with the monster, and Ducati won almost every race that it entered. The market (and analysts) have always been very short-sighted and extrapolated bike sales and licensing revenues to infinity.

Expectations have been somewhat downgraded since then. I would have thought now would be a great time to buy one of the most recognised brands in the world....

[neilkeogh]

It should be ok, didn't benetton help write The young Ones?
to name but one?

[guest1]

Originally posted by neilkeogh
It should be ok, didn't benetton help write The young Ones?
to name but one?

Yeah, wasn't he anti capitalist, till he became rich?


So basically, as of first quarter 2005:-
Gross margin was 32.2% of revenues including forex effects (or 34.2% excluding forex effects)
versus 35.9% during the same period a year ago.
EBITDA was Euro 8.5 million, down 31.4% including forex
effects (or 14.9% excluding forex effects) and accounted for 10.0% of revenues, versus 12.3% in the same
period last year.
Pre-tax profit for the Ducati Group was a loss of Euro 1.0 million in the first quarter of 2005, compared with a profit of Euro 0.8 million in the first quarter of 2004.
Unofficial Ducati worldwide registrations, an indication of retail sales, were down 16% versus last year’s first quarter. Registrations were up 8% in the US and 1% in the non-subsidiary countries, while decreases were recorded in France down 5%, Italy down 23%, Germany down 23%, Japan down 31%, Benelux down 36% and the UK down 36%.
The Company’s net debt as of March 31, 2005 was Euro 122.3 million, in line with the Euro 121.2million on the same date a year earlier, and up versus Euro 116.2 million as of December 31, 2004. The company’s gearing ratio was 82% as of March 31, 2005, versus 76% on the same date a year earlier and 78% on December 31, 2004.

Does all that make sense?

[beancounter]

At long last, something on this board that I actually understand...

[chicken]

and they've chosen to utilise an exemption available from the Italian stock exchange to not disclose the second quarter results. Looks like the finance department gets an extra two weeks holiday.

It's actually Multi-noodle owners that are stopping the company from facing a financial crisis - excluding them, bike shipments would have been down 19%.