French boss drops in as Rip Curl profit soars

THE CO-FOUNDER of Rip Curl's European arm has increased his stake in the company, joining founders Brian Singer and Doug Warbrick as an owner of the key voting shares.

By InvestSMART · 24 Dec 2009

By InvestSMART ·
24 Dec 2009

THE CO-FOUNDER of Rip Curl's European arm has increased his stake in the company, joining founders Brian Singer and Doug Warbrick as an owner of the key voting shares.

Frederic Basse has upped his holding from just 13,809 A-class shares, acquired in May, to more than 200,000 shares at the end of November.

A-class shares are entitled to receive dividends. The company paid a dividend of $1.12 a share in January and is expected to pay a similar amount next month.

Other senior executives including the financial chief, Rodney Adams, the French boss, Henri Colliard, and the Spanish boss, Raquel Perez, do not own A-class shares.

Details of the transaction were revealed in yesterday's filings to the Australian Securities and Investments Commission by the only privately held company among Australia's big three home-grown surfwear brands.

Mr Basse, a former French national surfing champion, founded Rip Curl's European business in 1983 with Francois Payot.

He lives in the French surfing town of Hossegor as head of product development and is credited with having developed seamless boardshorts. He reports to the European chief executive, Olivier Cantet, who has held the position since July.

Mr Basse also has 4112 E-class shares, which are non-voting.

Meanwhile, listed rival Billabong announced it had bought a minority interest in the Australian online surfwear retailer Surfstitch, which operates from a surf shop on Sydney's northern beaches.

Surfstitch sells all brands, including Rip Curl and Quiksilver, and is owned by Lex Pedersen, who set up the website from his Mona Vale premises in September last year.

Billabong told the Australian Securities Exchange that the purchase price was not material and was confidential.

Rip Curl, with headquarters in Torquay in Victoria, is the third-biggest player in an $8 billion market dominated by Billabong and Quiksilver.

Rip Curl Group sold $443 million worth of surf and snow gear, watches, shoes and accessories in 2008-09 through its wholesale and retail operations in the US, Europe and the Asia-Pacific.

It owns businesses in Thailand, Switzerland, France and Belgium, has a joint venture in Canada and also licenses its product in other countries.

The business generated a net profit of $33.9 million - the previous year's figure was $14.4 million.