EXECUTIVE MOVES
Former Oakley Chief to Helm Billabong, Dakine Sold
Scott Olivet, former chairman and chief executive officer of Oakley Inc., the performance eyewear and apparel company, has been appointed chief executive officer and managing director of the troubled Australian surf giant Billabong International Ltd.
Olivet’s appointment is part of a complex deal with Altamont Capital Partners, a private equity firm headquartered in Palo Alto, Calif. One part of the deal requires Altamont to arrange a $294 million refinancing deal, which would allow Billabong to repay some of its large debt.
Billabong will sell its brand Dakine to Altamont for $64.7 million. Altamont’s plans for the Hood River, Ore.–based maker of backpacks and outerwear have not been announced. Altamont also will appoint two representatives to Billabong’s board of directors; Jesse Rogers and Keoni Schwartz are both cofounders and managing directors of Altamont.
The deal also requires Olivet to take a $2.5 million stake in Billabong. Launa Inman, currently Billabong’s chief executive, will step down. She took the reins of the company in May 2012 and directed a “strategic plan” to change the company.
The announcement of a new CEO and sale of one of its leading brands could be the resolution to one of the most talked about mergers-and-acquisitions stories in the business world. It started in early 2012 when the company announced that it had lost more than 76 percent of its value after a multi-year spree of acquiring a number of companies such as leading skate and fashion brands RVCA and Element and West 49, a foundering Canadian retailer that Billabong recently announced it intends to sell.
To take over the company, Altamont vied with a team led by Sycamore Partners and Paul Naude, who served as the president of Billabong’s Americas division. Their competing proposals followed previous attempts by equity funds TPG Capital and reportedly Bain Capital to take over Billabong. However, these suitors dropped their bids after a due diligence period.
Olivet led Oakley during the bracing period when it was acquired by Luxottica Group in 2007. In 2009, Olivet became Oakley’s chairman and served as the chief executive officer of Renegade Brands LLC, which invests in action-sports labels. He also served as a director for Skull Candy Inc., a leading headphone company popular with the action-sports crowd.
The executive has the right pedigree to direct Billabong, said Greg Weisman, an attorney who specializes in representing persons and brands in action sports. He expects Olivet and the new board to come up with a strategic plan to save the company soon. “Notwithstanding today’s historic announcements, the real story of Billabong 2.0 is yet to be written,” Weisman said. “But we know now that it has a future, whereas yesterday that question was still quite murky.” Weisman is a partner in the firm Ritholz Levy Sanders Chidekel & Fields LLP and chairs its Apparel Practices Group.
