Portuguese soccer star Cristiano Ronaldo has acquired a stake in Chrono24, an online luxury watch sales platform, the German firm announced Wednesday, which claims to be a leader in this thriving market.
The percentage of his stake and the amount he paid were not disclosed in the press release and Chrono24 could not be reached for details.
A booming market
Among Chrono24’s other investors, Frenchman Bernard Arnault, head of world number one luxury LVMH.
In recent years, the pre-owned luxury watch market has experienced a boom driven by Millennials (born between 1980 and late 1990s) and Generation Z (born between 1997 and 2010) who want to consume luxury more responsible for the future of the planet.
Founded in 2003, Chrono24 claims on its site that it sees over “9 million visitors” every month with “over 500,000 watches from over 3,000 professionals and over 30,000 private sellers in over 100 countries.” .
Certification, an asset for these platforms
Employer of more than 500 people in its offices in Karlsruhe (southwestern Germany), Berlin, New York, Miami and Tokyo, the platform is valued at more than one billion dollars.
The watch industry has long been very cautious about online trading, fearing fake watches. Certification is precisely the appeal of this type of platform, experts believe: watches are checked by watchmakers to make sure they are not fake.
In the United States, a new platform called Bezel completed a fundraising campaign in early January from investors including former Disney chairman Michael Ovitz, comedian and actor Kevin Hart and musician John Legend.
Source: BFM TV
