Last Chance For MV?

Alan Cathcart speaks exclusively to MV Agusta’s boss as the company enters a crucial financial restructuring…

- Alan Cathcart

MV Agusta’s president/ CEO Giovanni Castiglioni, 36, is the only son of the late Claudio Castiglioni, the man whose love affair with the Italian trophy brand was such that he acquired, sold and repurchased it three times in the space of 20 years. In the months leading up to his father’s death in August 2011, Giovanni took over responsibility for running MV Agusta.

Harley-Davidson bought MV Agusta in July 2008 for a reported $109m, including $70m in assumed debt. But after spending millions of dollars to clean up the balance sheet, and to fund investment in new models and improved production facilities, in October 2009 Harley sold it back to the Castiglioni family for a nominal €3, and actually paid them to take it off their hands by putting $26m in an escrow account to provide the Italian company with operating capital for the next year. Harley’s 16 months of MV Agusta ownership is believed to have cost it upwards of $250m.

Giovanni Castiglioni took over the reins of MV in August 2010, since when commercial and sporting success led to Mercedes-Benz acquiring a 25% stake under its performance brand AMG in October 2014. However, while this seemingly initially brought positive results, with MV Agusta’s annual turnover exceeding €100m for the first time in 2015, the company found itself struggling early in 2016, seemingly with cash flow problems that forced it to stop production while it restructured.Then on November 18 it was announced that Castiglioni was recapitalising MV Agusta by selling part of the company to outside investment company Black Ocean Group. We were offered the opportunity to quiz

Castiglioni directly about these events and on his plans for the future in his office in MV Agusta’s lakeside factory at Schiranna on the outskirts of Varese, Italy.