BinDawood Holding to acquire stake in French influencer marketing agency

Saudi Arabia’s retail conglomerate BinDawood Holding entered into exclusive negotiations for the potential acquisition of a majority stake in Ykone.

Ykone is a subsidiary of TF1 Group, through its wholly-owned subsidiary, Future Technology Retail (FTR).

TF1 Group is a French leader in content production, publishing and distribution. The potential transaction will be undertaken through a French subsidiary to be incorporated by FTR, BinDawood Holding said in a statement to Tadawul.

BinDawood Holding Company, through its wholly owned subsidiary, Future Retail for Information Technology Company, announces it has entered into exclusive negotiations for the potential acquisition of https://t.co/RAOPkwL5cz

— Tadawul News (@TadawulFeed) July 24, 2022

Ykone is an international influencer marketing agency, with a proprietary technology offering, focused on travel, beauty, fashion and luxury brands. They have a presence in Europe, Asia, US and the Middle East.

It provides end-to-end services on strategy, talent management, content production and monitoring to more than 200 leading brands across the globe, including the MENA region.

As an acquisition agreement is reached, both parties will move forward with the regulatory and legal process to complete the acquisition procedure. Respective shareholders will be informed of any future developments in this regard.

BinDawood Holding has two unique retail chains, BinDawood and Danube, with a grocery retail chain footprint of 78 stores in 15 cities in Saudi Arabia. Recently, the group reported its first quarter 2022 financial results.

As per the company’s statement, revenue in Q1 2022 was SAR1,175.2m, up 4.5 per cent as compared to the same period last year. On a sequential basis, revenue increased by 11.2 per cent, from SAR1,057.1m in Q4 2021.

Meanwhile in March, the company bought a majority stake in e-commerce app manager and developer International Applications Trading Co for an initial payment of SAR107.5m ($28.7m) that could increase subject to future profitability milestones.

Read: Saudi grocer BinDawood buys majority stake in online developer