The acquisition was first announced on 6 February 2017 and at that time it was conditional on, among other things, certain procedural share registrations in Ethiopia and capital gain tax clearance on the sellers of NGSC.

Bagir said all conditions had now been met and the acquisition had been completed.

Eran Itzhak, Chief Executive Officer, commented, “Since 6 February 2017 we have been able to progress our plans to expand capacity at this excellent site alongside completing the transaction. Ethiopia, in time, is expected to become the primary manufacturing base for the Group as it combines scalable production with market leading cost and tax efficiencies enabling us to make a compelling case to global retailers to choose to work with Bagir.”

Following completion of the acquisition, Bagir will own 100% of Nazareth garments after it bought the first 50% stake in November 2014, and it has since invested in developing the manufacturing site with new machinery, this resulted in the company completing its first international export order for Swedish clothing retailer H&M in late 2016, along with a trial order for Haggar CLothing, a US men’s trouser retailer.

Over the next five years, the company intends to invest and expand Nazareth garments further.

The group said that Ethiopia has strategic advantages in terms of its duty-free export status for sales to the UK and US, low production and energy costs and proximity to Europe, which it believes will become a viable option from where international retailers will source significant volumes

source fana