By Cristina Roca 
 

Essilor International SA (EI.FR) and Luxottica Group SpA (LUX.MI) said Monday that they had completed their merger and formed a holding company named EssilorLuxottica.

Delfin Sarl, the majority shareholder of Luxottica, now holds a 38.93% share in EssilorLuxottica with voting rights capped at 31%, the company said. EssilorLuxottica employees hold 4.9% of shares, and the remaining 56.8% are free-floating, the company said.

EssilorLuxottica will launch a mandatory exchange offer for the remaining issued and outstanding Luxottica shares, after which Delfin's stake will decrease to a minimum of 31% of the share capital of EssilorLuxottica, the company said. Luxottica's shares will eventually be delisted.

"We are at the beginning of a new chapter in our history in which we so strongly believe, bringing together frames and lenses under the same roof and completing our vertically integrated business model," said Leonardo del Vecchio, executive chairman of EssilorLuxottica and of Luxottica.

Hubert Sagnieres, chief executive of Essilor, serves as EssilorLuxottica's executive vice-chairman, with equal powers to the executive chairman, the company said.

The company said it anticipates revenue and cost synergies resulting from the merger will have a net impact of 420 million euros to 600 million euros ($487 million-$695 million) in yearly EBIT in the medium term.

EssilorLuxottica will trade on Euronext Paris as of Oct. 2, it said, and will be part of the CAC 40 and Euro Stoxx 50 indices.

Write to Cristina Roca at cristina.roca@dowjones.com; @_cristinaroca

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 02, 2018 01:52 ET (05:52 GMT)