Cutter & Buck Inc. signed a definitive agreement to be acquired by New Wave Group AB, a public company based in Sweden. New Wave, a design and marketing firm that owns brands like Craft, Kosta Boda and Seger, had net sales of SEK3,530 million ($479.6 mm) for fiscal 2006 and operating income of SEK290 million ($39.4 mm).

The combination of the two companies provides Cutter & Buck with a significantly expanded product offering for the U.S. market and gives New Wave Group AB an upscale golf & sportswear brand to distribute in Europe. Under the terms of the agreement, which was unanimously approved by the boards of directors of both companies, Cutter & Buck Inc. shareholders will receive $14.38 per share of Cutter & Buck Inc. common stock for an aggregate consideration of $156.5 million.

Ernie Johnson, CEO, and Kaia Akre, president, of Cutter & Buck sat down in an exclusive interview with Sports Executive Weekly to discuss details of the acquisition and early plans going forward.

“New Wave…approached us several months ago indicating they were looking for…a couple different things for a U.S. partner combination. One being a premium apparel brand that wasn’t widely distributed in Europe that they could take to Europe and the other being really solid operations in the U.S. in terms of distribution, in terms of sales teams, and in terms of just overall operations that they could leverage to bring a lot of their brands into the U.S.,” said Akre.

In looking at Europe, Cutter & Buck will maintain the sales teams that it already has in place, mainly in the U.K., Ireland, Portugal and Spain, while New Wave will take over the other, less penetrated, areas, said Johnson. In the U.S., the market will likely see Cutter & Buck bringing over Orrefors and Kosta Boda as well as possibly some others. New Wave is currently the owner of specialty running brand Craft, which is already distributed in the U.S. by Craft USA. Sources at Craft USA said that the current deal between the distributorship here and the parent company across the pond is a multi-decade deal.