Luxottica joins the French Essilor in a marriage that is worth 50 billion euros. And that promises to lead beyond the Alps, one of the last valuable pieces, and entrepreneurship the national. In industrial terms, the aggregation that gives life to EssilorLuxottica will create a giant with a solid foundation: the understanding going to put together a leader in lenses with the kingeyewear in a marriage of which has a fabric row Mediobanca, the institute where the French have a role of first floor. Not the case for the number one of Luxottica, Leonardo del Vecchio, the agreement is "a dream" don e "after fifty years of waiting: the wedding will lead to the emergence of "a global player integrated" with a presence in more than 150 countries and 140 thousand collaborators. The agreement will create a giant with 15 billion in revenues, 3.5 billion of net operating income and the prospect of the synergies of costs and revenues for an amount between 400 and 600 million. A large group, in short, the potential of which the Stock exchange has taken notice awarding the title of Luxottica that Essilor in view of future synergies in the expected market growth of 2% until 2020.
Despite the good premises, the industrial, the dream of the self-made man, the Italian is likely, however, to transform in the nth slap for the Italian production system. The clues are already in the first information provided to the market on the aggregation operation. First of all, Delfin, the safe Of the Old, it will be the first time a member of the company post-merger with a share between 31 and 38 percent. Which means that the entrepreneur will not have the control of his group, so far driven with over 66 percent of the capital. Every new operation will have to be agreed with Essilor, which will have a blocking minority. Will weigh so much the strategy of the number one of the French band Hubert Sagnières, which has twenty-one years, less The Old and now leads a company without a shareholder of reference (90,4% is on the market).
In terms of the roles of the businessman, who in may will turn 82 years old, will assume the position of executive chairman and managing director EssilorLuxottica. Sagnières will be his deputy with the same powers. Technically, it is a situation of substantial equilibrium in view of a generational change that the businessman wanted to build, relying on the French. This can be seen from the balance of the board of directors of the new group: in the terms of the agreement it is expected that Delfin and Essilor have the same number of representatives (each will have the right to eight armchairs a total of 16). But the truth is that just a new member, even if only financial, to challenge the balance determined in the operation of aggregation by moving the needle of the balance in favor of one of the two largest shareholders.
The Old man, for his part, has tried to reassure the minds: "we will Continue to invest in Italy and France, we want to be a sample european that maintains strong roots". But in the meantime the new company post-merger will be listed on the Paris Stock exchange and Luxottica will say goodbye forever to Piazza Affari. So to force things, the move will bring right now dowry a reorganising the headquarters of Luxottica, a symbol of the good Italian business in the heart of Milan.
