Zalando, Europe's leading online retailer of footwear and fashion, announced plans for an initial public offering on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange in coming weeks.
The rapidly growing retailer plans to float 10 to 11 percent of its shares on the exchange, according to multiple media reports. The Wall Street Journal quoted one fund manager as estimating the IPO would value Zalando at more than €4 billion and generate more than $657 million in new capital.
Last week, Zalando reported is revenues grew by 29.5 per cent to €1.05 billion in the first six months (HY/2013: €809 million), while revenues in the DACH, or German speaking region of German, Austria and Switzerland, increased by 21.2 per cent to €594 million (HY/2013: €490 million). EBIT improved significantly, with a positive group EBIT margin for the first half-year 2014 of 1.2 per cent (HY/2013: -8.9 per cent) and DACH continues to lead the way, reaching clear profitability of 4.6 per cent. The significant margin improvement was driven by all major cost line items, including cost of sales, fulfillment and marketing. Zalando confirms its preliminary figures released on July 18, 2014.
“Achieving a positive group EBIT margin in the first half-year is a major success for Zalando. Historically, our performance in the first half of any financial year tended to be weaker than in the second half,” said Rubin Ritter, Member of the Management Board.
The company said the ramp-up of operations at its new fulfillment center in Mönchengladbach is on track and fulfillment efficiency has increased during the first half-year 2014. The Zalando mobile app was rolled out successfully across all international markets, resulting in a mobile traffic share of 41 per cent during the second quarter and over 3.8 million app downloads by the end of the second quarter. Zalando registered total visits of 323 million in the second quarter of 2014 (Q2/2013: 294 million). Active customers grew to 13.7 million at the end of the quarter, compared to 11.6 million at the end of the second quarter of 2013, which further improved marketing efficiency.
Zalando was founded by Robert Gentz and David Schneider in 2008 and its headquarters are located in Berlin. Following its success in Germany, Zalando launched an Austrian site in 2009 and shops for the Netherlands and France followed in 2010. In 2011 Zalando expanded to Italy, the UK and to Switzerland. Since 2012 Zalando has also been available in Sweden, Belgium, Spain, Denmark, Finland, Poland, and Norway. Deliveries were extended to Luxembourg in 2013. Today, Zalando sells more than 1,500 international brands, including many outdoor and athletic brands.
