Hotel Shilla, parent company of travel retailer The Shilla Duty Free, is to subscribe to 44 percent of the share capital of 3Sixty Holding LLC, parent company of 3Sixty Duty Free & More (formerly DFASS Group).
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The two companies detailed the agreement between Hotel Shilla and the Miami-based enterprise founded by US entrepreneur Benny Klepach 25 years ago.
The two parties will have additional rights in five years. Closing of the deal is subject to customary regulatory approvals.
Shilla Travel Retail President Ingyu Han stated: “Today we have achieved another important pillar of our development strategy. With the partnership with 3Sixty we aim to develop the business in the Americas region (more and more influenced by Asian travellers) and to leverage each other’s competencies in the digital business to continue to lead the omnichannel disruption of travel retail.”
“As is publicly known, negotiation with 3Sixty started quite a while ago and there were some hurdles* to overcome to achieve our objective. However, 3Sixty’s continued commitment to its strategic approach and its latest accomplishments, together with the expertise and enthusiasm we found in the 3Sixty management team, gave us the trust to eventually finalise this important expansion for our company,” Ingyu continued.
Benny Klepach commented: “We have always considered Shilla a potential strong partner to help us achieve our strategic objectives and continuing to lead the digital disruption in our industry. With Shilla in our shareholding structure we can compete successfully for every airport opportunity in the Americas.
“We will leverage Shilla’s competences in airport and digital retail and its merchandise strengths across categories. On the other hand, we will offer Shilla our knowledge of the specific regional environment, our recent developments in the digital business, our unique business model and strong relationships in the liquor category.”
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3Sixty Executive Vice Chairman Roberto Graziani concluded: “We at 3Sixty are very happy about this new strong partnership. It delivers to us a very powerful mix of expertise, competence, commitment and financial strengths that will help us achieve our vision. We are looking forward to starting this fruitful collaboration.”
(Source: Moodie Davitt Report)