Essilor strengthened its market position with the acquisition of several companies throughout the globe but the last one was certainly the most remarkable. Using its daughter company FGX, acquired only 2 years ago, the French lens company recently announced the acquisition of Stylemark which makes Essilor one of the largest, or probably the largest, supplier of cheap ready-to-wear reading glasses worldwide. Quite a remarkable year for HOYA. In Summer the company invited its clients to a benefit concert to support people in Japan suffering from the damages caused by the major earthquakes in the country. Only a few months later the company itself was hit by forces of nature when its major production plant in Thailand suffered from heavy water floods and had to stop production. In the mean time most of the problems are more or less solved and initiatives have been taken to avoid this kind of disasters in the future. Luxottica continued to expand its position as the number one in optics. It bought a few leading companies, including a production plant, in South America which is widely considered to be the number two existing market after Asia. The Italian company announced a preliminary license agreement with Giorgio Armani and published good results in terms of both sales and profit. Marchon achieved two new licenses and will soon launch the collections for Valentino and Salvatore Ferragamo. DITA made a collection for Thom Browne and Mikli launched one for good old Jean Paul Gaultier. At Mikli, Dominique Alba was replaced as CEO by Antonio Bortuzzo. Interesting to see whether he will be able to cooperate with Alain Mikli. The fairs aren’t worth mentioning as nothing happened in Paris, Milan or New York and neither at the Dutch fairs Centrop Sales, Hall of Frames and Sunglasses Fair. The most exciting thing was MIDO’s announcement to change its opening days to Sunday, Monday and Tuesday. And when there is finally something exciting like the development of the 3D technology, opticians seem to be completely uninterested. Polaroid, Marchon, Silhouette and Alain Mikli were involved in this topic with Polaroid as the winner so far with its participation in the first Dutch 3D movie called Nova Zembla. Even Prince and Princess Willem Alexander and Maxima wear Polaroid 3D glasses at the premiere of this very successful release. Anything else which inspired us? (to be continued)
·
