Ebike manufacturer Prophete is acquired

The Singapore-based company Dutech is taking over the insolvent bicycle and e-bike manufacturer Prophete from Rheda-Wiedenbrück. Business operations are to be maintained in their current form and with the existing employees. To all appearances, the Prophete Group can thus survive the insolvency.

Insolvency after cyber attack

Prophete had had to file for insolvency after a cyber attack. The company was attacked in November last year, after which business operations came to a complete halt for nearly a month. The company, which was already struggling financially beforehand, was unable to compensate for the resulting losses and filed for insolvency. After the opening of insolvency proceedings at the Bielefeld District Court, Manuel Sack of the law firm Brinkmann & Partner was appointed as insolvency administrator.

Business operations to continue

Sack assesses the takeover by Dutech, which has now taken place, as extremely positive. In this regard, the insolvency administrator emphasizes not only the cooperation of all parties involved, but also the fact that both the company’s employees and customers fully supported the takeover. Furthermore, he pointed out that the sales process had been completed extremely quickly and that the sustainability of the company’s orientation was underlined by the lively interest: “Within only ten weeks, we have succeeded in placing the Prophete Group on new entrepreneurial foundations. The international sales process has shown how sustainable strategic investors consider the trend towards e-mobility to be. At the same time, the lively bidder interest in Prophete and Cycle Union proves that the strategic orientation of the two e-bike and bicycle manufacturers is correct.”

Business operations were resumed after the opening of insolvency proceedings and are also expected to continue under Dutech. The employees will remain with the company and the strategic orientation will in all likelihood not change to any significant extent.

In addition to Prophete, Dutech is also acquiring CycleUnion. The two companies employed a total of 450 people in 2018, more recent figures are not available, and generated sales of 150 million euros.