Through its subsidiary, Hisense Luxemburg Home Appliance Holdings, the state-owned Chinese E&E group Hisense (Qingdao, Shandong; www.hisense.com) is planning a takeover bid for household appliances manufacturer Gorenje (Velenje / Slovenia; www.gorenje.com) – see Plasteurope.com of 21.03.2018. The Slovenian company made the announcement in local newspaper Delo.

Hisense has been growing quickly in the consumer electronics and household appliances sectors. It has partnerships with Whirlpool, Hitachi and TV manufacturer Loewe, among others. In 2015, the Chinese firm acquired Sharp's US TV business, followed by Toshiba's TV business unit in 2017. With approximately 75,000 employees, the group recently generated turnover of about USD 16 bn (EUR 13.5 bn).

Gorenje has been looking for a strong partner for several months after stakeholder Panasonic decided against strengthening its commitment. In total, three Chinese businesses have made bids. Besides Hisense, the Chinese household appliances competitors Haier and Hefei Meiling have shown interest. Currently, Gorenje's largest stakeholders are the Slovenian sovereign funds Kapitalska Druzba with 16.37%, the World Bank sister organisation International Finance Corporation (IFC) with 11.8% and Panasonic with 10.74% in shares.

With sales of EUR 1.3 bn in 2017, Gorenje is the smallest European household appliances manufacturer. BSH, Electrolux, Miele and the Turkish group Koc are far larger by sales.