It’s been a little over a year since Pelikan International announced the sale of its stationery division to the French-based Hamelin stationery group. The transaction was completed on December 13th, marking the transition of Pelikan’s fine writing division to new management. Mergers and acquisitions often lead to personnel changes, with many positions becoming redundant. This can result in reassignments or layoffs for affected employees. While the past six months have appeared to be business as usual under the new ownership, we are starting to see the moves Hamelin plans to make in order to streamline its business model. Today, it was announced that Hamelin will take over the distribution of the Pelikan brand starting on January 1, 2025, and as a result, the sales and distribution locations in Hannover and Falkensee under Pelikan Vertriebsgesellschaft (PVG) will be closed.
It has now been six months since Pelikan’s May 23rd announcement regarding the sale of their assets and business interest to Holdham SAS, a holding company for the French based Hamelin stationery group. I have seen several comments since then that have attributed some of the company’s recent design choices as well as the surfeit of October releases to the direction and perhaps over exuberance of new ownership. In actuality, it appears that the company has yet to officially change hands, not surprising when you consider the complexity of the entities that now need to be disentangled. While there hasn’t been much information made available in the public domain, a few recent regulatory filings do shed some light onto the current state of affairs. When Pelikan entered into the conditional share purchase agreement (CSPA) with Holdham, they hired KAF Investment Bank Berhad (KAF IB) to advise and negotiate the terms of the transaction. A filing with the proposed arrangement was first made to Bursa Malaysia Securities Berhad on June 29th. In that document, a “Long Stop Date” was established. Specifically, the filing stated, “If the Conditions Precedent have not been satisfied by (and including) 31 October 2023 (“Long Stop Date”), any party may, within 10 business days as from such date, at its entire discretion, terminate the CSPA by written notice to the other party…” A few additional stipulations were attached to that statement which you can read about here if so inclined. October 31st has come and gone so where do we now stand? Continue reading below to find out.
News of Pelikan International Corporation Berhad’s (PICB) decision to divest itself of its core stationery business back in May sent shock waves through the fountain pen community. Pelikan’s product range is vast, covering a wide array of school and office supply products. While their fine writing instruments division is a much smaller slice of the overall Pelikan pie, it means everything to their fans. Brand fealty aside, Pelikan’s contributions to the writing community over the last century cannot be ignored, especially when you examine just a few key examples amongst their innumerable writing instruments as well as their inks. More recently, the Pelikan Hubs event has become one of the premier social gatherings outside of pen shows for our little coterie. Of course, it hasn’t all been smooth sailing. The brand’s luster has worn, tarnished over the last several years by Pelikan’s failure to invest and modernize their production, some notably inconsistent designs, a lack of exciting nib selections, wide regional pricing disparities, and, perhaps most vexing of all, the discontinuation of the ink view on their Souverän models. Perchance these were all signpost pointing to the eventuality that we find ourselves at today. The Hamelin Group will buy the brand in a sale that is expected to be closed by year’s end. The hopeful believe that this might be the dawn of a new era for Pelikan, heralded by a fresh vision from clear eyed investors and an infusion of capital. The pessimist prognosticates the beginning of the end, a stripping down and dilution of the brand to nothing more than a shadow of its former self. This dour view is sadly informed by experiences with other once famous pen brands which were sold, their heritage and brand integrity squandered for profit. Which direction will Pelikan end up going? Only time will tell but I have gained some insight as to which direction we may be heading. As I alluded to in a prior post, I reached out to Hamelin to try and clarify their intentions for the brand. What I learned was somewhat heartening. Read on to find out what Hamelin had to say for itself.
On May 23rd, Pelikan announced that it was, “currently in negotiations with prospective strategic buyers to dispose substantially all its assets and business interest.” To this end, they hired KAF Investment Bank Berhad to advise and negotiate the terms of the transaction. The news took many by surprise and was met with quite a buzz in the industry. There has been a lot of speculation about who the prospective buyer might be. We now know that Holdham SAS, a holding company for the French based Hamelin stationery group, has entered into an agreement with Pelikan International Corporation Berhad (PICB) to acquire the Pelikan Group GMBH (PGG) which will allow PICB to exit its core stationery business. Many regulatory hurdles still have to be overcome in Germany and PICB’s shareholders will need to vote in order to approve the acquisition, but the deal is expected to proceed unimpeded with finalization anticipated for some time in the fourth quarter of this year, tentatively before the end of October. PICB also needs to carveout a number of its assets that are not included in the acquisition (e.g. Pelikan Procurement Sen Bhd, Pelikan Taiwan Co. Ltd., eCom Logistic GmbH, MOLKARI, and Kruezer Produktion + Vertrieb GmbH). The sale price has been reported at 136 million euros ($148.5 million) which Hamelin will pay in cash. The bulk of the proceeds are to be distributed to the company’s shareholders. In yesterday’s filing with Bursa Malaysia, Pelikan cited challenges with their distribution channels, production technology, and the global economy as the rationale for selling the brand which they’ve held onto since 2005. Wholesalers, Pelikan’s main customers in the past, have increasingly been replaced by more direct distribution channels, a change that has resulted in high complexity and increased margin pressures. At the end of the day, Pelikan felt that they lacked the resources necessary to continue to invest into the changes within those channels resulting in the company being less competitive in the global marketplace. Read on to learn just how the deal is expected to unfold.
