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Vienna (pte027/03.04.2013/16:10) - There are new job threats for 279 employees of the Austrian electrical retailer Niedermeyer after the company filed for insolvency and made plans to close almost half its branches.
According to the Association of the protection of Creditors of 1870 (Kreditschutzverband von 1870, KSV), the electrical firm which employs 580 people in 98 stores across Austria is liable to pay 28.8 million Euros. It will have to pay 840 investors a 20 percent rate within two years.
Christoph Vavrik from the KSV said: "It's the most important case of insolvency in Vienna this year. We expect the legal proceedings to begin very soon."
On the Austrian scale, it's the second biggest case of bankruptcy after Griffnerhaus in Carinthia which owed a total of 32.9 million Euros to over 700 contractors.
The Niedermeyer balance shows a total debenture of 35 million Euros. The company said the losses due to the current economic conjecture and the tight network of subsidiaries were the cause of its economic downfall. Online shopping was also mentioned as a cause of Niedermeyer's financial collapse.
A mixture of internet-ordering services and experience-focused stores is said to be the new concept for the stores which are not being closed down. They are to be modernised and reinvented into "experience shops" much in the way of the popular Apple and Samsung stores where clients are free to test out the products there and then. Company officials have said that there are already negotiations going on with potential investors.
Niedermeyer's managing director Werner Weber said: "I am convinced that only a radical restructuration of the company and focusing on our top-locations in connexion with multi-shopping, "experience" concepts can secure the future of Niedermeyer."
The net turn-over for last year (excluding VAT) fell from of 111 million Euros (figures: 2010/2011) to around 105 million Euros.
The KSV said the 28.8 million Euros the firm is liable to pay already include costs for the closure of 53 stores. KSV spokesperson Vavrik said: "We will insist that the company provides us as soon as possible with a plausible plan for the future of the company as well as a finance plan which supports the desired restructuration plan."
Weber (under his company Sapentia GmbH) holds 50.1 percent of Niedermeyer shares. The remaining 49.9 percent belong to Hypo Equity Beteiligungs AG which also holds important shares in the Vorarlberger Landes- und Hypothekenbank AG (43.29 percent) and the Hypo Tirol Bank (21.78 percent).
The owners have communicated having invested six million Euros in the company in the last years.
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