Ïã½¶ÊÓÆµ Announces Conclusion of Capital and Business Alliance with B4F Co., Ltd.

April 12, 2019

Ïã½¶ÊÓÆµ (headquartered in Minato-ku, Tokyo; Yoshihisa Suzuki, President & COO; hereinafter ¡°Ïã½¶ÊÓÆµ¡±) announced today that it has decided to conclude a capital and business alliance with B4F Co., Ltd. (headquartered in Shibuya-ku, Tokyo; Armel Cahierre, CEO; hereinafter ¡°B4F¡±), which operates the members only online boutique MILLEPORTE.

B4F was established in 2010 to operate BRANDS for FRIENDS, a members only online boutique that was launched in Berlin, Germany in 2007, in the Japanese market. In 2014, B4F changed the site¡¯s name to MILLEPORTE, which means a thousand doors in French, with a view to future business expansion. The company currently handles a wide range of lifestyle goods including fashion, interior goods, food products and household appliances, and has grown into one of Japan¡¯s most prominent members only brand e-commerce sites.

Ïã½¶ÊÓÆµ is working toward expansion of the e-commerce business in its brand business and entry into new distribution channels as part of the ¡°Reinvented Business,¡± which is a basic policy under the medium-term management plan ¡°Brand-new Deal 2020.¡± B4F is expanding its operations in the e-commerce site business, including launching new services that draw on knowhow built up through MILLEPORTE, and Ïã½¶ÊÓÆµ decided to conclude this latest agreement because the creation of various synergies can be expected through collaboration with B4F.

Ïã½¶ÊÓÆµ and B4F will combine their extensive experience and knowhow in the brand business and e-commerce site operation business and seek to diversify the brand e-commerce business. Ahead of this latest alliance, CI Shopping Service Co., Ltd. (hereinafter ¡°CiSS¡±), a subsidiary of Ïã½¶ÊÓÆµ which plans and runs family sales of lifestyle goods for Ïã½¶ÊÓÆµ Group employees and various brand events, and B4F concluded a business alliance agreement, and they also launched initiatives to develop CiSS as an omnichannel. In the future, Ïã½¶ÊÓÆµ and B4F will continue aiming for the creation of customer value and the expansion of synergies from their alliance through maximum utilization of each other¡¯s strengths.

MILLEPORTE Website