Yazaki to Acquire Cablelettra’s Wire Harness Unit

Yazaki Corporation announced on Tuesday the firm reached final agreement to acquire automotive wiring harness business of Cablelettra of Italia on July 29. Yazaki Corporation purchases all the shares through newly established subsidiary, Yazaki Automotive Products. Yazaki Corporation’s automotive wiring harness sales exceeds 200 million euro and the world market share increases by 1 percentage point by 2013 through the acquisition of plants in 5 countries.

Cablelettra’s sales were around 170 million euro mainly from automotive wiring harness in 2010. The firm’s world market share is estimated to be around 1%. The firm supplies the products for major automakers including Fiat of Italia and Volkswagen of Germany. The firm has plants in Italia, Poland, Tunisia, China and Brazil.

Yazaki Corporation has apparently world No.1 market share in automotive wiring harness. The firm tries to expand the business in Europe and Brazil through the acquisition. The firm hires around 120 employees and takes automotive wiring harness research and development unit of Cablelettra.

Yazaki Corporation has studied the acquisition in years. The firm participated in auction process for Cablelettra after the Italian maker went bankrupt in 2009. Yazaki Corporation won the auction in February 2011 to reach final purchase agreement.

Yazaki Corporation posted 667.9 billion yen of sales for domestic business and 495 billion yen of sales for offshore subsidiaries for the year ending June 2010. Automotive parts including wiring harness represent 86.7% of the domestic sales and the offshore business also focuses on automotive parts.