Two beauty conglomerates are discussing a mostly stock merger that could be announced within weeks. This comes as L'Oréal completes its £4.6 billion Kering Beauty acquisition and LVMH shares fall 28 percent in Q1. The holding companies are consolidating whilst the actual brands underneath them (Nike forecasts revenue drops, Carven loses its design director after a year, DoDo's CEO exits after less than a year at Kering) burn through creative directors and market share. Corporate finance is moving faster than culture can.
Three separate moves today reveal the same strategic bet: beauty conglomerates partnering on longevity science, Google stripping screens from wearables, and Kelly Wearstler designing modular systems for H&M.
The pattern is moving from discrete products to infrastructure plays. Brands are realising that owning the underlying system (the supplement regimen, the biometric platform, the furniture module) creates more value than owning the individual object.
For people who’d rather be early and wrong than late and safe.