LVMH's Moët Hennessy teams up with Campari in wines, spirits e-commerce venture

MILAN (Reuters) - LVMH's Moët Hennessy and Italy's Campari have agreed to team up to invest in wines and spirits e-commerce companies and create a European ecommerce player in the sector.

In a statement on Monday, the two groups said Campari would transfer its stake in online wines and spirits company Tannico into a newly set up joint venture.

The deal, subject to regulatory clearance, envisages the sale of half the JV's equity capital by Campari to Moët Hennessy for 25.6 million euros ($30 million) in cash, they said.

"While e-commerce was already a growing channel for wines and spirits, the global pandemic has triggered a significant acceleration," Moët Hennessy CEO Philippe Schaus said.

The new venture will be headed by current Tannico CEO Marco Magnocavallo who will remain a key minority shareholder in the business.

Tannico, whose business is 90% B2C, also owns a majority stake in Ventealapropriete.com, an e-commerce platform selling premium wines and spirits in France.

Tannico and Ventealapropriete.com generated pro-forma combined sales of more than 70 million euros last year.

($1 = 0.8434 euros)

(Reporting by Stephen Jewkes; Editing by Sandra Maler)