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Best Buy will sell its half of European arm to Carphone Warehouse for $775 million
As Best Buy attempts a return to financial well-being, it's decided to sell the 50 percent share it still owns in Best Buy Europe to fellow joint venture partner Carphone Warehouse. The price is set at about 500 million GBP ($775 million, mostly in cash) and is expected to close by June. Best Buy paid $2.15 billion for its share of the business back in 2008 and the first branded store opened in 2010, but it was already looking for a way out by 2011. That's when it closed its UK stores and paid Carphone Warehouse $1.3 billion for its share in the US Best Buy Mobile business. Reporting the joint venture as discontinued operations for its next fiscal year will cause Best Buy to take a $200 million charge, and it's tossing Carphone Warehouse another $45 million to satisfy outstanding obligations like closing the Global Connect JV the two started in 2011. There's no word on any moves for its business in Mexico, Canada and China, and CEO Hubert Joly says this sale "should not suggest any similar action" elsewhere.
Best Buy-bye: Retailer bids farewell to the UK with blowout sale
While Americans plow through their cash and cards, lapping up the litany of Black Friday specials -- and readying themselves for the inevitable Cyber Monday second wave -- it looks like our trans-Atlantic cousins will also get a taste of discount joy. After a brief 18-month stint, Best Buy UK is packing its bags, and it wants to travel light. Both the online and physical stores will see prices snipped by between 10 and 30 percent, though we don't know whether this will extend to Best Buy's full product line or simply less desirable devices. Either way, the brick-and-mortar stores have been closed over the weekend in preparation. Bargain-hunting Brits should be able to grab some some cut-price Christmas treats when the eleven stores reopen on Monday. [Thanks Jason and Thomas]
Best Buy to close UK operations, 1,100 jobs in jeopardy
Best Buy Europe, the joint venture between Best Buy Inc. and Carphone Warehouse, has been shuttered after just 18 months in business. In that short amount of time, it lost £80 million ($127 million), largely due to consumer belt-tightening and increased competition from cheaper online retailers. Up to 1,100 jobs will be lost at the eleven UK stores currently open in Thurrock, Bristol and Wolverhampton, among other locations, bringing to an end the company's ambitious plan to open 200 stores across Europe. At the same time, the US giant declared it would buy out its European partner's stake in the Best Buy Mobile chain as it continues to pull out of unprofitable foreign operations. Update: We've got some more on what this deal means. Buying out Carphone Warehouse is gonna cost $1.3 billion plus $8 million annually for five years. The two aren't splitting up for good, since they're also starting another joint venture called Global Connect (good luck with that one, fellas). Separately, the company announced it was grabbing mindShift technology, a cloud service provider for small and medium-sized enterprises for a cool $167 million. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
Best Buy opens first UK store in Thurrock, we go hands-on (video)
Ah, there it is, UK's first-ever Best Buy store, officially born at 7am local time yesterday. Naturally, we had to be there to witness such magical moment for Britain's consumer tech market -- the Brits had longed for an injection of energy and professionalism to the seemingly slacking chain stores. Many would agree that DSGi's two main brands -- Currys and PC World -- are on the naughty list, even after their recent relaunch. From what we saw today, it looks like Best Buy's already heading in the right direction. Let's start with the front-line employees. Most of these Blueshirts provided genuine technical answers rather than bluffing their way out, plus we were given product recommendations with no desperate sales pitch as commonly seen in other stores. When we revealed our identity to one of the sales reps, he confirmed that they were trained to not force random products onto customers -- quite the opposite culture to his old days at DSGi (assuming he was telling the truth). We sure did appreciate this new-found shopping freedom in gadget stores, but did the other customers feel the same way? Find out what we heard after the break.%Gallery-92099%
Carphone Warehouse sees retail sales rise 13%
Who says everyone has to report bum quarters these days? The Carphone Warehouse -- which is only Europe's largest, most recognizable independent mobile phone retailer -- has just reported that retail sales during its most recent quarter were up 13 percent to just over £1 billion ($1.48 billion). Moreover, its connections were up 3% to 3.7 million and subscription connections rose 3% to 1.3 million, though revenues of its TalkTalk Group were down slightly (2%) to £347 million ($514 million). Still, bigwigs at the firm aren't ignorant to the market, noting that "weaker trading conditions" are likely to continue, and thus, affect future numbers. Still, we'd say these guys deserve a round of golf claps for just breaking into '09 in the black.[Via mocoNews]
