The Luxottica Essilor Mega-Merger: Company Overviews

In this segment of Industry Focus: Consumer Goods, Motley Fool analyst Vincent Shen provides some key background on fashion frames retailer Luxottica Group (LUXTY) and lens manufacturer Essilor (ESLOY -0.02%) as the two companies seek to combine their businesses in a $50 billion deal. Learn more about their respective revenues, market share, product offerings, and positions within the industry.

A full transcript follows the video.

This podcast was recorded on Jan. 24, 2017.

Vincent Shen: This $50 billion deal is with two companies that, in my opinion, very much lead their respective spaces within the world of eyewear. Asit, please bear with me, I'm going to try and set the stage here for these two companies, who they are, and then I'll let you dive into some specifics behind the deal. But for listeners who might not be as familiar with these names -- we don't cover them that often on the show, and they're based in Europe -- so our listeners can get a good idea of the scale of their operations, which I think is very important, and how they will come together.

The first, Essilor, their history. An investor overview describes a company based in France, has a nearly 170 year history as Essel, one of the two companies that merged to form the current company, was originally founded in 1849. It has about 60,000 employees in over 60 countries. Products are distributed to over 100 countries; 32 production plants, 490 prescription labs, 16 distribution centers. I think all and all, what you need to know is that they make over 500 million lenses annually. Their products get distributed through eyecare professionals, online channels. It is a leader in its space, has 40% market share for prescription lenses, 15% market share for both sunglasses and reading glasses, and that does not even include some of the optical equipment and instruments they also produce. For those of you listening who do have prescription lenses, you might recognize some of the names in their portfolio, which includes Transitions, Varilux. The company trades on the Euronext Exchange with about a $25 billion market cap and $7.7 billion in revenue for the trailing 12 months.

Luxottica, which is the other company that is in this transaction, this is one that, I've spoken to a lot of people about this company, mostly as consumers, they don't know it, but when I mention some of their in-house brands and the many others they license with, people know exactly what I'm talking about. Luxottica is based in Italy, founded in 1961 by Leonardo Del Vecchio, who is now the second richest man in Italy. He's a majority shareholder in the company with an approximately 62% ownership stake through his family holding company called Delfin. Luxottica has 79,000 employees. Their manufacturing operations are based in Italy, China, U.S., Brazil, and India. Their home country of Italy makes up just over 40% of that output. Eighteen distribution centers give the company a network that covers more than 150 countries. They also have, besides producing these glasses, a retail network of 7,400 stores of chains that many of you will recognize, including LensCrafters, Pearle Vision, Sunglass Hut. They're also behind EyeMed, which is a major U.S. vision benefits provider. Their brand portfolio includes Ray-Ban, Oakley, Oliver Peoples, and then they license major brands like a Burberry, Chanel, DKNY, Ralph Lauren. So, Luxottica is the largest eyewear company in the world. It's market cap is about $26 billion, with $9.9 billion of revenue for the trailing 12 months. Once they come together, they will still very much be the largest eyewear company in the world.