🇦🇪 Dubai Fashion Week casts a wider net to secure designer brands. The biannual showcase, held from Feb. 1-6 in the United Arab Emirates hub, featured over 25 haute couture and ready-to-wear brands on the runway. Founded by the Dubai Design District (D3) and the Arab Fashion Council, the event has cast a wider net for this season including designers from Iraq, Kuwait, Lebanon, Morocco, Turkey, the UAE, India, Indonesia, Australia and European countries. “Steadfast demand for luxury fashion – defying global market trends – and diversity in craftsmanship and creativity continue to cement the Middle East as the new growth hub for design talent,” said Khadija Al Bastaki, senior vice president at D3. This edition saw Beirut couturier Antoine Kareh and Indian couturier Manish Malhotra present their collections alongside Dubai designer residents like Dima Ayad, Lama Jouni, Michael Cinco and Mrs Keepa’s Mariam Yeya. [BoF Inbox]
🇨🇳 China retaliates against US tariffs and Mexico negotiates a delay. Beijing has hit back at US President Donald Trump’s new 10 percent tariff against China, imposing a 15 percent tax on some US coal and liquefied natural gas and a 10 percent tariff on crude oil, agricultural machinery and certain automobile categories. It will also add American companies — including Calvin Klein- and Tommy Hilfiger-owner PVH — to its ‘unreliable entities’ list over their stance on Xinjiang cotton, place export controls on critical minerals like tungsten and launch an anti-monopoly investigation into Google. Following talks with the Canadian prime minister and the Mexican president, Trump agreed on Monday to delay by one month the start of 25 percent tariffs on the two countries after both reportedly agreed to some of his demands on border security and drug trafficking. [CNN, BBC]
🇰🇷 Wella Professionals withdraws from the South Korean market. Areteon, the local distribution partner of the hair care brand’s German parent Wella Company has reportedly notified around 2,000 salons of the move to cease operations in the market. “Despite our repeated requests to reverse this decision, we regret that we were unable to change the outcome,” said Areteon, describing it as a “sudden and unilateral decision from Wella’s global headquarters.” Wella is majority owned by the US private equity firm KKR. [Chosun Daily]
🇨🇳 Shein to face EU consumer law probe under e-commerce crackdown. The China-founded, Singapore-based ultra-fast-fashion company faces potential fines as the European Union prepares to launch an investigation into its compliance with consumer laws over the sale of illegal products. Separately, the bloc’s executive branch, the European Commission, is unveiling a new strategy aimed at cracking down on e-commerce platforms like Shein and Temu being used to ship unsafe products from China and other non-EU countries. [BoF]
🇧🇩 Bangladeshi government is closing twelve Beximco apparel factories. The country’s largest private sector conglomerate, a banking-to-pharmaceuticals multinational founded in 1972, has been in trouble since it became severely indebted amid a fraud scandal rendering it unable to fulfil export orders. The latest move by the government comes after the company laid off of tens of thousands of workers last year. The firm’s textiles and garment manufacturing division Bextex has listed Target, PVH and Zara among its clients. [Sourcing Journal]
🇮🇳 Indian personal care major Emami Limited posts 7 percent profit rise. The Kolkata- based FMCG firm has reported a consolidated net profit of 278.98 crore rupees ($32.2 million) for the third quarter ended Dec. 2024, up from 260.65 in the previous year. Parent Emami Group is a multinational conglomerate founded in 1974 as a cosmetics brand whose diversified holdings now range from retail and real estate to paper and food. The firm’s personal care, beauty and wellness division includes brands BoroPlus, Navratna, Crème 21 and Kesh King among others. [Economic Times]
🇹🇷 Turkey’s minimum wage increase to impact apparel manufacturers. The country’s 3 percent minimum wage hike that went into effect Jan. 1 amounts to 22,104 Turkish lira (about $621.22) per month, up from 17,002 Turkish liras last year (around $477.83). Though it would have been welcomed by labour unions and workers, manufacturers say it adds to numerous other pressures, putting Turkey at further disadvantage compared to sourcing countries in South and Southeast Asia where wage costs are typically two-thirds cheaper. [Sourcing Journal]
🇮🇳 India’s Garment Labour Union wins landmark settlement against factory. The union did not disclose details of the payout but described it as “significant” in the case against Bengaluru-based Sonal Apparel Private Limited Industries, a supplier to retailers such as Primark, Only & Sons and The Children’s Place. The settlement concludes a three-year legal battle that the union and the Asia Floor Wage Alliance, a consortium of garment trade unions, waged in a bid to reimburse more than 300 garment workers of wages it said were “unlawfully withheld” from them by SAPL during the pandemic lockdown in 2021. [Sourcing Journal]
🇨🇳 Swiss watch exports to China plunged 19% in 2024. Annual exports to mainland China fell 19.0 percent to 151.2 million Swiss francs ($165 million) and those to Hong Kong fell 18.7 percent year-on-year, according to figures published by the Federation of the Swiss Watch Industry, dragging down global Swiss watch exports to -2.8 percent. Demand fell in the sector’s other leading markets including United States (-1.0 percent) and Japan (-12.7 percent). [Swiss Info]
🇮🇳 India’s Kalyan Jewellers posts 21% profit increase in Q3. The Thrissur-based company whose portfolio includes its namesake brand and digital-first brand Candere reported consolidated net profit of 218.68 crore rupees ($25.2 million) for the quarter ended December. Ramesh Kalyanaraman, executive director of the jewellery retailer, which operates more than 250 showrooms globally, said: “The current quarter has started off well despite the volatility in gold prices. We are upbeat about the ongoing wedding season.” [Economic Times]
🇮🇳 Indian personal care group Dabur sees 1.8% profit rise in Q3. The Ghaziabad-based FMCG company founded in 1884 in Kolkata by Dr. S. K. Burman has reported consolidated profit after tax of 515.82 crore rupees ($59.5 million) for the quarter ended Dec. 2024, against revenue from operations of 3,355.25 crore rupees ($387.4 million) during the period. The FMCG firm, which sells products in the haircare, skincare, wellness and food categories including its namesake brand and Vatika among others, specialises in ayurvedic, herbal and natural formulations. [Economic Times]
🇨🇳 China-founded Shein makes low-key return to India after 2020 ban. The e-tailer has restarted its India operations in partnership with Reliance Industries Ltd. (RIL), as it seeks to tap buyers in the world’s most-populous country where it was banned alongside dozens of other Chinese apps in 2020 on security fears. Shein’s mobile app and India website, Sheinindia.in, were launched without any fanfare last week by NextGen Fast Fashion Ltd. — a wholly-owned subsidiary of RIL unit Reliance Retail Ventures Ltd. overseen by Isha Ambani. [BoF]
🇮🇳 India’s Raymond Lifestyle reports 60 percent profit decline in Q3. The company, one of the world’s largest producers of suit fabric and a maker of men’s shirting fabric and branded apparel, recorded consolidated net profits of 64.17 crore rupees ($7.4 million) for the quarter ended Dec. 2024, against 162.43 crore rupees in the comparable period in the previous financial year. Managing director Sunil Kataria attributed the firm’s poor performance to challenging market conditions and muted consumer demand. [Economic Times]
🇸🇦 Kering announces sustainability award winners in Saudi Arabia. The French luxury group and the Saudi Fashion Commission have named three local winners for the first edition of the Kering Generation Award X Saudi Arabia, including second-hand online luxury marketplace Amused, founded by Sarah Teymoor and Mansoor Banaja, Darah Solutions Lab, a firm founded by Rawan Alderaibi which tackles textile waste, and Asteri, a premium Saudi beauty brand and B Corp-certified firm founded by Sarah Al Rashid. [Arab News]
🇮🇳 Indian fashion retailer Arvind records 13% profit increase in Q3. The Bengaluru-based firm, which has a portfolio of owned and licensed international brands including Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger and a denim fabric manufacturing business, has reported consolidated net profit of 1.03 billion rupees ($11.90 million) in the quarter ended Dec. 2024, up from 917 million rupees a year earlier. [Reuters]
🇮🇳 Indian direct-to-consumer footwear brand CHK raises $2.5 million. The Bengaluru-based startup spearheaded by DealShare co-founder Sankar Bora, has secured the funding from venture capital firm Accel, jewellery retailer Bluestone and individual investors. The sneaker brand was founded in October 2024 by Bora, Deepan Babu, Bharat Mahajan, and Deepak Patil. [Economic Times]
