Weeks after the brand shifted from being distributed by Audio Products Australia to Melbourne based Qualifi German TV Company Loewe has filed for insolvency.
ChannelNews has been told that Chinese Company Hisence is now a contender to take over the troubled German high-end TV maker after earlier striking a panel supply deal with Loewe.
In Australia Loewe has had a chequered history, back in the 1980’s they were seen as a high end CRT TV brand then with the advent of flat panel TV’s the brand suffered because of a lack of marketing and a shift by consumers to Korean and Japanese brands over European TV offerings.
Loewe fell into difficulties after it failed to keep up with mass-market rivals such as Samsung and LG Electronics, and struggled to cope with a slide in the average price of TV sets.
Ralph Grundl the Marketing and Sales Director at Qualifi said “We are still waiting to hear what is happening. We knew that the Company had problems and we are aware that they are talking to investors. It will be a loss if they are unable to find funding as they have a great product range”.
Directors of the German Company filed for protection from creditors’ demands in July in an effort to give themselves breathing space while it sought an investor and restructured the company.
The company, founded 90 years ago in Berlin, claims that they have sufficient funds to keep operations running until the end of the year but thereafter “it would be over” without an investor, CEO Matthias Harsch said.
Overnight Harsch said “We have six bids from investors from which we will choose in the next four weeks”.
Earlier this year, Loewe posted a 39 percent slump in first half sales of 1.04 billion and a net loss of 26.7 million euros for the period.
In a statement issued to ChannelNews today the Company said ‘The core of the change process at Loewe is the move from being a TV manufacturer to an entertainment platform system provider. Besides specialised hardware knowledge, it is becoming increasingly important for Loewe to have greater software expertise to facilitate the management of its multimedia smart home-entertainment systems. Moreover, the company will join forces with partners to start offering special premium content exclusively for Loewe customers, thereby underlining the strong benefits of Loewe systems”.
