In 2011 the Bulgari family, majority shareholder of the renowned Italian jewellery house established in 1884 by Greek silversmith Sotirio Bulgari, joined forces with the LVMH Group and transferred its majority shareholding in Bulgari SpA. The L3.7bn, all-share deal made the Bulgaris the second largest family shareholder of the LVMH Group. After the acquisition FRANCESCO TRAPANI, great-grandson of the founder, CEO of Bulgari SpA and the driving force behind its success over the past 20 years, was made a member of the LVMH board of directors and appointed President of the LVMH Watch & Jewellery Division. From his position now supervising Bulgari, Chaumet, De Beers, Fred, Dior Watches, Tag Heuer, Zenith and Hublot, he gives LUCY REITER the view from the top of the luxury pyramid.
Today heritage is a term that is used with a sort of wilful abandon. In fact I would guess that ‘heritage of the brand’ fights it out with ‘DNA of the brand’ for the title of most abused marketing cliché...
One great example of technoluxe is the new McLaren supercar, released just over a year ago now… This is for two reasons: (1) The first McLaren, the F1, was priced around £1.2 million in the early 1990s. The MP4 12C, released last year, is a superior car in every possible way and is priced at a tenth of this figure. (2) The technology used in the McLaren MP4 12C ensures the car is not replicable without it. It not only takes the car into the technological age, but it has, since the car’s release last year, already been subject to improvements of a similar nature to the kind of upgrade in technology consumers experience in the software sector. In essence, you could call this upgrade the MP4 12C v.1.2. Upgrades in technology will
continue to improve the car at a steadily increasing pace, in much the same way that, say, tablet computers keep being released, each one outdoing the performance of the last.
