War between EssilorLuxottica and GrandVision escalates

The conflict between eyewear groups EssilorLuxottica and GrandVision is escalating: both are taking ever more drastic steps against their adversary in order to bend their “marriage” to their advantage.

Battle intensifies

EssilorLuxottica (famous for its eyewear brands Ray-Ban and Varilux) has confiscated information regarding the merger that was on GrandVision computers on two locations: a third party has copied the data. GrandVision (owner of optics chains like Pearle and Eye Wish) has allowed the copying to happen, but currently refuses that the copies are actually used for the proceedings. The third party has them in store for possible use after a court case, but neither EssilorLuxottica nor that third party has access to this information“, the group responds.

This new step is the next step in an escalating conflict that started out with a merger proposal and subsequent 7.2 billion euro deal. However, the relationship became sour because of the coronavirus pandemic: both companies suffered disappointing results and whereas for GrandVision this was a reason to continue the quest towards the merger, for the Franco-Italian company it was a reason to rethink things. EssilorLuxottica now claims the Dutch company has violated the terms of the merger contract as it refuses to demonstrate how it was run during the lockdowns.