US private equity firm Carlyle Group acquires Dainese brand from Investcorp for €630 million.

• Famed Italian moto apparels brand has Carlyle Group as its new owners.

• US private equity firm acquired brand from previous owners Investcorp.

• Dainese brand sale to Carlyle Group reportedly worth a whopping €630 million.

The world famous devil-horned moto apparels brand Dainese has changed ownership once more. Standing as its new custodians now are US private equity firm Carlyle Group who reportedly purchased the brand earlier this month from previous owners Investcorp.

The sale price Investcorp put Dainese up for to Carlyle Group? A whopping €630 million – over RM2.9 billion. Yup, that a lot of money, given the Dainese brand’s business growth in recent years, perhaps this is a worthy investment for its new owners.

Investcorp first acquired Dainese from founder Lino Dainese back in 2014 for a reported sum of €130 million – over RM605 million. Since then, the Bahraini firm has doubled the brand’s sales under its stewardship, with yearly revenue pegged around €250 million – over RM1.1 billion.

They also grew the brand’s portfolio – which includes the AGV helmets brand – after acquiring bootmakers TCX recently in 2020.

Noteworthy here too is the brand’s acquisition by the Carlyle Group itself – the world’s  second-largest private equity group that boasts assets under management worth US$276 billion – over RM1.1 billion.

Through this acquisition, the Carlyle Group plans to focus on further growing the brand in the United States and China through expanding Dainese’s distribution network, and perhaps by adding more brands into the group too.

For now, the continued role of Dainese’s current CEO, Cristiano Silei, remains unclear. But given the brand’s profitable efforts under his watch, we reckon Silei’s place at the top of Dainese’s management will likely remain.

This new investment from The Carlyle Group is certainly going to heat things up for Dainese, especially in its quest for supremacy in the airbag safety apparel market space against rivals Alpinestars. This, in turn, means good news for consumers as we can expect more innovation and product count to come.