Report says Mytheresa may buy Richemont’s YNAP

Has Yoox Net-A-Porter (YNAP) finally found a buyer? A report on Thursday said that Mytheresa is buying the online in-season and off-price business from Richemont.

The Fashion Law (TFL) cited “sources” saying the New York-listed company is buying the group, some time after the initial deal for it to be taken on by Farfetch fell through as that company dealt with its own spectacular implosion and acquisition by Coupang.

YNAP owns off-price sites Yoox and The Outnet but crucially, also includes luxury sites Net-A-Porter and Mr Porter that compete directly with with Mytheresa. That raises the question of how those sites would continue long term under Mytheresa ownership.

Fashionnetwork.com has contacted Richemont for comment.

The report also said that other interested parties such as Bain Capital and Permira had dropped out of the race to buy YNAP due to its falling sales and rising losses.

If the story is true, it may not be confirmed for some time with TFL also saying that it could be “days or months” before an official announcement is made.

It’s claimed that Richemont “will invest between €800 million and €1 billion in a capital increase for YNAP to cover the platform’s losses”, allowing it to exit a business segment that has dragged down its profits for some time and that has had activist investors increasingly calling for change.

Transformational year

Such a sale would mean that the luxury e-commerce landscape would have changed beyond all recognition in just the last 12 months.

Some years ago, Net-A-Porter transformed the internet into a valid home for luxury while Yoox showed how the internet could be used to clear excess inventory at high prices and also how it could launch monobrand e-stores for a big stream of luxury labels.

Both seemed unstoppable at one point. And with rival Farfetch also growing fast (and making ambitious acquisitions as well as listing on the New York Stock Exchange) and Matches being bought in a deal valuing it at £800 million, online luxury was booming.

But after e-commerce being almost the only game in town during the pandemic, the e-bubble burst (something that also happened at the value end of the price scale) and widening losses turned the luxury e-tail market sour.

Less than a year ago, Farfetch was rescued from collapse by ‘Korea’s Amazon’, Coupang. Then Matches was rescued at a fraction of its previous value by Frasers Group, only to go into administration and be shuttered when Frasers realised the extent of the investment need to turn it around.

Mythersa has shown itself to be a survivor in all of this drama and has emerged with its competitors now more likely to be webstores attached to physical store businesses (like Selfridges, Flannels, Printemps et al) rather than online pureplays.

Of course, such an acquisition wouldn’t be risk-free for Mytheresa, which admitted earlier this year that it had faced pressures in the luxury slowdown. And absorbing a business that’s much bigger than its new owner won’t be easy.