Heuking Kühn Lüer Wojtek provides advice to Otto Group on acquiring interest in Kitaro Fashion

Hamburg-based Otto Group acquired a 49% interest in Kitaro Fashion Group, headquartered in Düsseldorf. The company founded in 1996 merchandizes the Kitaro, Arqueonautas, Signum, Jette and J.J. Men brands European-wide.

Otto Group is a retail and service group with more than 55,000 employees, active worldwide. In its core business, mail-order retail, the company is the global market leader. In e-commerce, Otto Group is the second largest online retailer worldwide behind Amazon. The third supporting leg of Otto Group's multi-channel retail business is over-the-counter retailing.

Kitaro inspired Otto Group's interest among others through its high creativity and its range of goods, its integrated vertical organization, a deep wholesale network and its own outlets in Germany and the Netherlands.

Heuking Kühn Lüer Wojtek (Hamburg) provided advice to Otto Group under the lead of Dr. Jörg Schewe (Mergers & Acquisitions, Corporate Law). Partners Dr. Andreas Walle (Employment Law) and Dr. Søren Pietzcker, LL.M. (Trademark Law) as well as salaried partners Dr. Kai Erhardt (Finance/Commercial Law) and Dr. Kai Bandilla (Commercial Law) also acted as counsel.

Otto GmbH & Co KG was represented by Martin Mildner (Lead Corporate Counsel • Director Mergers & Acquisitions) and Dr. Steffen Jaeniche (Corporate Law/Antitrust Law).
Buse Heberer Fromm, Essen (Dr. Martin Hamm, attorney) acted as counsel to Kitaro Fashion Group.