Fashion Investments and M&A

Date: March 2024
Buyer: Mirabaud Lifestyle, Impact & Innovation Fund, D1 Capital Partners, JAM Fund
Target: Urbanic London
Business: Urban fashion
Value: $150million
Details: Urbanic, a London-based brand that focuses on socially-responsible urban fashion, has completed a Series C investment funding round totalling $150 million from a group of international investors, including Swiss-entity Mirabaud Lifestyle, Impact & Innovation Fund, US-based D1 Capital Partners, and JAM Fund, amongst other European co-investors. Urbanic was founded in 2019, with an emphasis on environmental and social responsibility throughout the value chain of its products, and its use of technology to generate fashion designs. The investment will be used to improve its technology – particularly around AI to generate further designs and online content – and to improve the sustainability of its supply chain, minimising inventory waste by aligning designs with actual demand for its products.

Date: March 2024
Buyer: General Catalyst, Voyager Ventures
Target: Packfleet
Business: Electric courier
Value: $10million
Details: Packfleet, a fully-electric parcel courier with B Corporation status, has received a $10 million investment through a Series A funding round led by VC firms General Catalyst and Voyager Ventures, with co-investors Creandum, Entree Capital and Founder Collective. Based in London, Packfleet was founded in 2021, and currently operates a fleet of 130 electric vans, employing 35 people at its head office and 100 people as drivers. The company plans to use this investment to expand - both within London and to the rest of the UK - later this year. Packfleet counts female-founded fashion resale platform HURR, and big names such as Pizza Pilgrims, among its customers.

Date: February 2024
Buyer: Tomorrow Ltd
Target: A-Cold-Wall
Business: Luxury Streetwear
Value: Undisclosed
Details: Samuel Ross, the founder of London luxury streetwear band A-Cold-Wall, has sold his remaining shareholding in the brand to Tomorrow Ltd, a multi-service business accelerator for fashion brands, who now owns 100% of the brand. Samuel Ross, a former intern of Virgil Abloh’s, founded A-Cold-Wall in 2015, which has continued to scale over the last 9 years. Tomorrow Ltd is a multi-service business accelerator, which advises fashion brands on sales and distribution, manufacturing, operations and product development, and counts Parisian brand Coperni amongst its investments. Tomorrow Ltd first invested in A-Cold-Wall back in 2018, and has continued to work closely with the brand ever since. As well as selling the business, Samuel Ross is stepping down as creative director of the brand, and going forwards will focus on designing products under his own namesake, Samuel Ross & Associations (SR_A).

Date: February 2024
Buyer: Carlyle, IMI
Target: Very
Business: Online Fashion Retailer
Value: £125m
Details: Liverpool-based company Very, owned by Barclays and known for its collaborations with celebrities like Michelle Keegan and Holly Willougby, has received a £125m investment from US investment firm Carlyle and UAE investment house IMI (International Media Investments). £85m of this, provided by Carlyle’s Global Credit arm, will be made available immediately, with the remaining £40m coming from IMI. Very has granted a floating charge over several of its group companies as security for the investment by IMI (with the same companies having been pledged as security for previous debt investments made by Carlyle). As part of the investment package, Carlyle and IMI will each be able to appoint a director to Very’s board of directors, and will bring their ‘deep network of relationships, industry expertise and capabilities’ to Very, while Very’s current non-executive chairman Dirk Van den Berghe will step down and be replaced by Aidan Barclay, as interim chairman until a new appointment is made.

Date: January 2024
Buyer: Authentic Brands Group
Target: Sperry
Business: Footwear
Value: £130 million
Details: Authentic Brands Group has acquired American footwear brand, Sperry, from Wolverine World Wide (WWW) for a rumoured $130million. Sperry, a heritage brand operating for 90 years, specialises in boat shoes and loafers, and was previously sold to WWW in 2012 as part of a package including Keds, Saucony and Stride Rite, for c.$1.23billion. As part of this acquisition, Aldo Group has entered into a licence with Authentic Brands Group to become Sperry’s North American partner for operations and global footwear design, production and distribution. The sale will allow WWW to focus on and invest more into its ‘core’ brands, which include Sweaty Betty and Keds.

Date: January 2024
Buyer: Harry Styles
Target: S.S Daley
Business: Luxury Menswear
Value: Undisclosed
Details: Pop superstar Harry Styles has become a minority shareholder in the label S.S. Daley, following an investment of an undisclosed amount in January 2024. London-based Steven Stokey-Daley (the designer behind the label) won both the British Fashion Council Foundation Award for Best Emerging Designer, and the LVMH Prize for Young Designers, at the 2022 Fashion Awards, scooping a cool £400,000 prize money cash injection in the process, which he used to scale the business and move to a new design studio. Steven Stokey-Daley is known to be Harry’s go-to designer for music videos and photoshoots, after being introduced to the star by Harry’s stylist in 2020 and providing the ‘Floral Sebastian Trouser’ worn by Harry in his ‘Golden’ music video. The investment will help S.S. Daley to “grow its direct-to-consumer business” while it focuses on “brand longevity and scaling the business into a modern, British heritage house”.

Date: January 2024
Buyer: Secure Trust Bank Commercial Finance
Target: Ann Summers
Business: Lingerie retailer
Value: £8m
Details: Lingerie retailer Ann Summers has received a £8m asset-based lending facility from Secure Trust Bank Commercial Finance (STB), to finance its plans to grow its omnichannel marketing, selling and customer service offering. The facility comes as Ann Summers sets its sights on further growth and sales over the next few years, amid a 7% increase in its sales (to just under £100m) in its financial year to June 2022.

Date: January 2024
Buyer: Steven Bartlett
Target: Luxe Collective
Business: Luxury Fashion Re-sale
Value: £100k
Details: Steven Bartlett, of BBC’s Dragons’ Den, has invested £100,000 in Luxe Collective, a British luxury fashion resale platform, founded in Liverpool by brothers Ben and Joe Gallagher back in 2018. Similar to the likes of Vestiare Collective and Tradesy, Luxe Collective offers a platform for private sellers to sell pre-loved luxury items to buyers, once the items have been authenticated. Luxe Collective, which has amassed 2.2 million social media followers, is part of a growing trend which emphasises shopping pre-loved items as a means of combatting the ‘fast fashion’ model, and aiming for a more environmentally-friendly textile industry.

Date: December 2023
Buyer: Praetura Ventures
Target: HURR
Business: Fashion Rental
Value: £8m funding round
Details: Praetura Ventures has invested in HURR, a female-founded British luxury fashion rental platform, as part of a seed funding round. The investment now brings HURR’s fundraising total in this round to just under £8m, with funds Octopus Ventures (an investor in Depop) and Ascension also investing. Previously, HURR’s 2021 funding round closed at £5.4m. HURR’s platform includes over 130 brands and is not only a peer-to-peer rental platform, but also counts John Lewis, Mulberry and Net-a-Porter among its partners, providing them with their own fashion rental service platforms. HURR’s strategy is to “make the shift in fashion from ownership to access happen ASAP”.

Date: December 2023
Buyer: Coupang
Target: Farfetch
Business: Luxury Fashion Resale
Value: £400m
Details: South Korean e-commerce entity Coupang – known as South Korea’s own Amazon - has confirmed plans to acquire Farfetch under a pre-administration rescue deal, with the transaction to complete in early 2024. As part of the acquisition, US-listed Farfetch will have its shares de-listed, following 5 years on the New York Stock Exchange. While the total transaction value has not been disclosed, some reports suggest it could be as much as just under £4m and includes a $500m emergency funding injection into Farfetch, which was on the brink of insolvency. Despite this, Farfetch’s anticipated acquisition of a c.47% stake in Net-a-Porter has been terminated, owing to its financial difficulties. It is reported that Farfetch has over $1billion outstanding term loans and credit facilities.