STOCKHOLM, Sweden, July 4, 2005 (PRIMEZONE) -- Lindex has signed an agreement with a consortium led by Anders Arnborger for the sale of its Twilfit operation. The sale means that Lindex will divest 38 wholly-owned Twilfit stores, 10 franchise stores and the Twilfit brand name. The transfer of the operation will take place on 1 September 2005. Ahead of the transfer, Twilfit will be restructured into a separate company within the Lindex Group. Thereafter, the consortium will take over the running of Twilfit. All of the approximately 250 staff in the stores involved will be offered employment in the new company.
The deal involves a one-off write-down of goodwill amounting to SEK 25M. This will not affect the cash flow. The transaction will also have a positive effect on profit per share.
Lindex will retain six Twilfit stores in Stockholm and Uppsala and transform them into Lindex stores. The stores are: Taby centrum, Odenplan, Fridhemsplan, Sergel, Drottninggatan and Uppsala Forum. This will strengthen both the profitability and growth of Lindex's Swedish operation.
"With the sale of Twilfit we can focus all our resources on the Lindex brand and our Lindex stores. Twilfit will have better prerequisites to develop outside the Lindex Group and we believe that the consortium led by Anders Arnborger will be a good owner of Twilfit," says Goran Bille, President and CEO of AB Lindex.
Anders Arnborger is the founder and former President of WBM which owns the rights to the Bjorn Borg brand. When Anders Arnborger left WBM in 2004 he sold all his shares in the company.
AB Lindex (publ)
Lindex is a fashion Group which has 311 stores in the Nordic market and 23 stores in Germany. The Group's business areas are Lingerie, Ladies' Wear and Children's Clothing. Learn more about Lindex on: www.lindex.com.
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