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Kering Eyewear revenue growth slows down to 2% in Q1
Kering Eyewear was again a rare bright spot in the results presented earlier this week by French luxury group Kering for the first quarter of 2025. The eyewear unit’s sales were up by 3 percent year-on-year to €476 million or by 2 percent on a comparable basis. However, this marks ...
EssilorLuxottica adds price hikes to US tariffs mitigation arsenal, reports strong Q1 performance
The industry leader is planning to increase its prices in the US but mostly counts on its ongoing supply chain diversification and innovation and M&A pipelines to mitigate the impact of US tariffs. Q1 revenue was up by 8 percent at constant rates, driven by the DTC division.
European market softness weighs on Inspecs FY2024 results
Slightly correcting preliminary results communicated at the end of January, INSPECS Group has announced that its revenue amounted to £198.3 million (€228.8m) in fiscal 2024, down by 2.5 percent year over year. In constant currencies, the group’s topline was flat versus FY 2023.
Conant Optical revenue and profit up sharply in 2024 on volume and price mix effects
Annual sales were up by 18 percent to RMB 2,061 million. The company is investing into increasing production capacities and smart eyewear lens R&D.
Antitrust suit threatens Meta’s revenues, perhaps R&D
After more than four years, the US FTC has gotten Meta into court.
Kering Eyewear builds up in-house supply chain in Belluno
The eyewear division of Kering is acquiring Visard, a specialist in injected plastic frames, and taking a minority share (for now) in Mistral, an acetate eyewear manufacturer.
Menrad Germany files for insolvency
Menrad Group has announced that Ferdinand Menrad GmbH, its German entity, has entered insolvency proceedings due to an expected future liquidity bottleneck. The insolvency proceedings only concern the German legal entity of the group.
Topcon seeks to move from a hardware-based to a solutions-based business after ownership change
US-based private equity firm KKR will be acquiring a majority stake in Topcon Corporation as part of a planned management buyout (MBO), both companies have announced. The tender buyout offer, which is scheduled for the end of July this year, values the Japanese equipment maker at 348 billion yen (€2.2bn).
Fitting Box and Ocuco renew their partnership
Since 2018, Ocuco, the Irish-based supplier of optical software has integrated Fitting Box’ virtual try-own and other eyewear visualization tools in its products for independent optical practices and retail chains. Both companies have just announced that they have agreed to renew their partnership for five years. Ocuco says on its ...
Zeiss tests e-commerce model with partner ECPs in India
ZEISS India has announced the launch of a new e-commerce initiative in partnership with local partner eye care professionals (ECPs). The company said that the new service, dubbed Lead Generation Service, was aimed at enhancing the optical retail of its local partners by providing them with an additional sales channel ...
Malaysia bans optical devices and contact lenses e-commerce
Malaysia’s Medical Device Authority (MDA) has made a public announcement to inform consumers that the online sale of optical devices and contact lenses is strictly prohibited in the country. These products are categorized as prescribed medical devices and therefore require a prescription and must be provided by a registered optician ...
Study looks at eyewear VTO usage and perception in France and the US
Fitting Box, the industry leader in virtual try-on (VTO) services, has announced that it powered 215 million VTOs last year, up from 143 million in 2023 and 120 million in 2022. Also, the annual number of 3D frames produced by the company – the digital rendering of actual frames – ...
Mixed feelings in Fukui over “Made in Japan” eyewear amid export surge
Exports of Japanese eyewear products have strongly rebounded in recent years, lifted in part by the growing popularity overseas of the Made in Japan label, notably in the US and Europe. However, a recent survey, as well as an initiative by the Fukui eyewear industry association, shows mixed feelings over the country-of-origin label in the region. Meanwhile, the shortage of workers and the increasing number of subcontractors closing shop remain the main challenge for the local industry.
Eyewear stocks down by 2% in Q1, and by 10% since April 2
We are publishing here with a slight delay our quarterly chart on the evolution of the stock prices of eyewear companies. The reason for us delaying this update was the scheduled announcement of US President Donald Trump’s new reciprocal tariffs on April 2, which was certain to impact stock markets ...
How will US consumers react to higher eyewear price tags?
The announcement by US President Donald Trump of wide-ranging and higher-than-expected “reciprocal tariffs” last week has left the global economy reeling, particularly in Asia where post-COVID supply chain reroutings aimed at “derisking” China became much less relevant overnight.
Sustained growth in the Polish eyewear market partly driven by e-commerce boom
Eyewear retail sales rose by 8 percent year on year to 3.6 billion Polish zloty (€870m) last year and are expected to keep growing significantly in 2025.
