Lotus (company)

Lotus is a Finnish-American investment company founded by Kasperi Salovaara on January 20, 2021, after the merger of his previous company Vuori into Illustrious and subsequent promotion to co-CEO of the company, mainly it's diversified holdings division.

History
Other catalysts to Lotus's founding were Salovaara's successful acquisitions of a 51% stake in Amazon.com, as well as a majority stake (estimated to be over 80%) in the Walt Disney Company. On January 21, 2021, UK Government Investments sold a 49% stake in Channel Four Television Corporation to Lotus in hopes of making C4's survival through the "pandemic-ruined economic environment" possible. Lotus plans on being only a silent partner in the venture.

To help expand Lotus's media holdings outside Disney, Salovaara formed Scandic Media Group with initial backing from Fremantle and Nordisk Film, meant to showcase talent from Scandinavia.

On January 27, 2021, Crown/SoftBank's subsidiaries SB Triangle Holdco (Jersey) Limited, Cinarra Systems Japan Co., Ltd., Line Mobile (Japan) Co Ltd, Moonlight Finance LLC, SB Pan Pacific Corporation, SB Cloud Co., Ltd., Encored Japan Co Ltd, Skywalk Finance GK, Cybereason Japan, OYO Hotels Japan GK, LA BI Holdco LLC, SVF HOLDCO (UK) LIMITED, SB INVESTMENT HOLDINGS (UK) LIMITED, WeWork Japan GK, DiDi Mobility Japan Co., Ltd., and West Raptor Holdings LLC were all merged to form a new subsidiary within Lotus, called Lotus AO Corporation. Lotus also formed Lotus AI Corporation for artificial intelligence related assets from SoftBank.

On January 31, 2021, Lotus acquired Hoot USA assets (excluding Charter Communications and Dish Network assets), Hoot Wholesale and Hoot Business Solutions. On February 18, 2021, with Lotus Technologies' acquisition of i.am+, Will.I.Am joined the board of directors at Lotus.

On February 20, 2021, Lotus announced a lucrative deal with Orange Africa Holdings Limited, which would see all of the latter's shareholders (excluding Saudi Arabiäs GOSI & PIF and TeleInvest, Viettel and the governments of United Arab Emirates, Nigeria, Iran, Qatar and Morocco - all of whom will still hold shares in the venture) receive USD$50 billion in cash, Class B shares offered in Lotus (to be shared to governments, investors of the respective countries, as well as put some into public float) as well as consultation roles within the Orange Africa joint venture. Following the acquisition's start, investors and other influential people (such as presidents, princes, moguls) from other African countries were interested in acquiring shares in Lotus, resulting in a bizarre affair, where Lotus now has financial influence over a whole continent, aside from a few countries.

On March 3, 2021, Lotus increased its stakes in Alibaba Group and Tencent, respectively to 40% and 45%, making them the largest individual shareholder in both companies. On May 22, 2021, Lotus announced a new elevator division, Schindler GmbH.

Class B shares
Lotus has the tendency to give Class B shares in itself and its affiliate company Illustrious, when it comes to almost all of its acquisitions. The shares are also unique compared to other Class B share offerings, as the shares were given to more and more people, it was decided that rather than have one voting right, one share would instead have half a voting right, encouraging collaboration among investors. Every employee under Lotus-owned companies also own one share each.

Criticism
Lotus received immediate backlash from many industry investors in the US and the UK, due to acquisitions of major stakes in Channel Four, Disney and Amazon.

Assets

 * Channel Four Television Corporation (~49%)
 * Penguin Random House - inherited from Illustrious's acquisition of Bertelsmann
 * Scandic Media Group - formed out of select assets from Fremantle
 * Solar Films - acquired from Fremantle and Nordisk Film
 * Solar Republic
 * Aito Media - acquired from Fremantle
 * Drive Studios - Denmark; with additional offices in Berlin and New York
 * Drive Oslo - Norway
 * B-Reel - Stockholm, London, Los Angeles, New York, Barcelona and Berlin
 * B-Reel Films
 * Yellow Film & TV
 * Concorde Television
 * Scandic Productions - London
 * Expectation Entertainment
 * Little Delicious Media
 * Lotus Plant - venture capital division for seed, venture and growth stage funding, as well as division for internal start-ups; formerly called SB Innoventure
 * umamill corporation
 * conect.plus corporation
 * Schindler GmbH - the leading elevator and escalator manufacturer in the world
 * Pureband (acquisition pending; companies not part of the deal are King, PopCap, Embracer Group, Pureband Productions or Ubisoft)
 * Krafton Pearl Abyss (81% total stake; consisting of a 21% stake inherited from Illustrious and a 60% stake inherited from Vuori)
 * PlatinumGames
 * Sports Interactive
 * Epic Games (40% stake held together with Illustrious)
 * Electronic Arts
 * Playrix
 * Eipix Entertainment
 * Jagex
 * Rovio Entertainment
 * NC Dragon Labs
 * Keywords Studios
 * Exigent Game Art
 * Crown North America - new holding company formed for Vuori Mobile, Verizon and Bell Canada
 * Vuori Mobile - United States and Canada
 * - 50/50 joint venture with the Eclipse Group
 * and
 * - operates in Ontario and possibly British Columbia; rest of the operations were transferred to Vuori Mobile Canada in 2021
 * - integrated with Chatr Mobile's operations in Ontario and British Columbia
 * Lotus Technologies
 * Wow Group
 * Krake
 * YoYo Games
 * Zillow (co-owned with The Eclipse Group)
 * Lotus AO Corporation - Tokyo, London and Delaware; formed with assets inherited from SoftBank acquisition
 * Alibaba Group (40%)
 * Alibaba, Inc. - joint venture between Alibaba Group and Lotus AO Corporation
 * Tencent (45%)
 * Banco Inter (10%)
 * Nvidia (10%) - pending on Arm Holdings acquisition by the company
 * LAOC Sales Group GK - offers services of Oyo Hotels, WeWork, Cinarra Systems, Encored, Alibaba Cloud, Line Mobile, Cybereason and DiDi, in Japan
 * Offers Co., Ltd. - Introduction of membership services provided by WeWork Japan GK
 * Lotus AI Corporation - Tokyo
 * Findability Sciences Inc. (51%)
 * Observable
 * Nokia Group
 * Lotus Lifestyle Foods
 * Oatly AB
 * Lotus Banking Group - a public limited division, where Lotus is a majority shareholder
 * ING Group
 * UBS
 * Banco Santander
 * Llyods Banking Group
 * SEB Group
 * Itaúsa
 * Khemco LLC - a spin off of LG Corporation's chemical business LG Chem, as a temporary holding company
 * LG Household & Health Care - could become Unilever Korea, pending Lotus' acquisition of Unilever
 * The Face Shop
 * Khemco Hausys - formerly LG Hausys
 * Khemco MMA - manufactures methyl methacrylate
 * LG Corporation
 * LG Sports
 * LG Twins
 * Changwon LG Sakers
 * LG Yeonam Academy
 * Yeonam University of Technology
 * Yeonam University
 * LG Yeonam Cultural Foundation
 * LG Art Center
 * LG Sangnam Library
 * LG Science Land
 * LG Sangnok Foundation
 * LG Science Hall
 * LG Management Development Institute
 * LG Economic Research Institute
 * LG Academy
 * Other assets:
 * S&I Corporation
 * V-ENS
 * B&E Partners
 * Youth Partners
 * Twin wine
 * Geovine
 * Pixdix
 * G2R
 * HS Ad
 * Elvest
 * Wisebell
 * Toms Media
 * Alkymedia
 * W. Brand Connection
 * G Outdoor
 * BugscomAd
 * Jiheung
 * Second-largest shareholdings in Saudi Aramco, Tesla, SpaceX and Facebook
 * Wisebell
 * Toms Media
 * Alkymedia
 * W. Brand Connection
 * G Outdoor
 * BugscomAd
 * Jiheung
 * Second-largest shareholdings in Saudi Aramco, Tesla, SpaceX and Facebook

Semi-disowned assets
These assets are not declared as companies under any sort of ownership by Lotus or its affiliates, but instead hidden under multiple complex legal structures involving surrogate owners and shell corporations. These are usually still related to Lotus for sake of profitability or some other undisclosed reason.


 * British PMI Enterprises (Cayman Islands) Limited - first of three shell corporations created by Styhon Battersea to distance themselves publicly from Marlboro Brands; owns both a 33% stake in Dutch Tobacco N.V. and a 34.21% stake in the Willow Corporation SARL
 * Marlboro Brands, Inc. - a 49/32/19 joint venture with Dutch Tobacco N.V. and the Willow Corporation SARL, formed out of a merger between, and , resulting in a speculated 30% global market share; the merger was controversial, but was later justified as creation of a rival to the largest producer  among the uncertain status of U.S.-China relations - to comply with antitrust regulations, Winston, Pall Mall and Benson & Hedges brands as well as the ownership and manufacturing rights to JTI brands in Australia and also their share in  were completely sold off to Japan Tobacco
 * Marlboro Brands Indonesia - merger between and
 * - acquired under a 50/50 joint venture with ; the deal was made on the premises that Altria will handle the US market for JUUL, while Styhon Battersea handles the international markets
 * Dutch Tobacco N.V. - second of the three shell corporations, located in Rotterdam; owns both a 33% stake in British PMI Enterprises and a 26.79% stake in the Willow Corporation SARL
 * The Willow Corporation SARL - the last of the three shell corporations, located in Monaco; owns a 33% stake each in both Dutch Tobacco N.V. and British PMI Enterprises
 * Introl - an energy company working in the oil, coal and other energy industries

Inherited from Vuori

 * Universal Music Group (90% stake) - in turn inherited from Vuori's acquisition and merger of Vivendi
 * Crown Cellular
 * Hoot Wholesale - consolidation of OWL Telecom's wholesale operations around the world
 * Hoot Business Solutions - merger between all of the B2B, and cloud services operations of Hoot USA's predecessors (including ),, Claro Enterprise Solutions (formerly Telmex USA), Telvista, Global Hitss (the three being formerly owned by America Movil), Cam IT Solutions, Solcon, StartReady, RoutIT (the four being formerly owned by KPN), and , as well as the international subsidiaries's call center and data center operations
 * Cloudwatt
 * - communications service
 * The Mountain Foundation - philanthropy division of Vuori
 * Horizon Capital
 * Horizon Solutions - risk management and analytics
 * - inherited from BlackRock acquisition, integrated with ETFs from Vanguard owned by customers who wanted to continue using Vanguard/Horizon's services
 * CK Swire - formerly Styhon Battersea Industrial Commodities and Luxury Goods, in turn formed by a merger between and
 * CK Swire Purchasing Services - formerly ServeOne
 * HSE Mining - Australia
 * LG International Corp - South Korea
 * Xelias Holdings
 * Xelias - formed as a spin-off of 's facilities management operations
 * Xelias - acquired in 2020; specializes in airport services
 * SATS HK
 * Xelias Laundry Services - a 45/55 joint venture with ; formerly China Pacific Laundry Services Limited
 * Vogue Laundry - inherited from Cathay Pacific acquisition
 * Xelias Pacific Properties - merger between and
 * Swire Industrial Services Pty Limited - materials handling
 * Swire Environmental Services - merger between and
 * Swire Water - consolidation of Veolia and Suez's water management operations
 * Swire Water North America - formerly Purestream Services
 * Swire Waste Management Limited - 50/50 joint venture with ; closure pending
 * Swire Bio-Commodities N.V. - headquartered in Amsterdam, with satellite offices in Motherwell and Yokneam Illit; formed out of a merger between Argent Energy (biodiesel production), NanoSpun Technologies (recyclable fiber development) and Avantium (bioplastic development)
 * Hutchinson Port Trust
 * Kalari - bulk logistics
 * Kalari Papua New Guinea - formerly East West Transport
 * Kalari Marine - 50/50 joint venture between Kalari and Swire Marine Services Limited; formerly branded as Swire Bulk
 * Swire Marine Services - integrated with Steamships Trading Company (Papua New Guinea)
 * Swire Marine Services Limited - merger between Swire Pacific Ship Management (manning), Quadrant Pacific, Tradco Shipping Limited and Guadalcanal Travel Services Limited (shipping agencies), Offshore Solutions Limited (offshore shipping services), SCF Swire Offshore Pte. Limited (vessel operator), Pacific Towing (towing and salvage) and related businesses; operates in Australia, New Zealand, Mainland China, Papua New Guinea, Singapore, Taiwan region, Fiji, Samoa and New Caledonia
 * Swire Marine Energy - 50/50 joint venture with Energy; formerly Swire Blue Ocean A/S
 * Swire Emergency Response Division
 * Swire Oilfield Services Limited
 * Swire Shipping - integrated with Consort Express Lines
 * - France
 * - integrated with Screg
 * Sacer - consists of Sacer Atlantique, Sacer Paris-Nord-Est and Sacer Sud-Est
 * (28.3%)
 * - acquired in 2020
 * Colgate Palmolive (PNG) Ltd - 50/50 joint venture with Colgate Palmolive; inherited from Steamships Trading Company acquisition
 * Swire Foods
 * James Finlay Limited - sells Finlays tea
 * Qinyuan Bakery - baked goods chain
 * Taikoo Foods Limited - distributes food products under the “Taikoo” brand and other brands in China (both Mainland and the Hong Kong SAR); merger between Taikoo Sugar Limited, Taikoo Sugar (China) Limited and Swire Foods Trading (China)
 * - inherited from the Swire Group acquisition
 * The Coca-Cola Company China - a 81/19 joint venture with for manufacturing, production and distribution in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan, formed through a merger of all bottling operations owned by Swire Group within China, Hong Kong and Taiwan
 * Swire Coca-Cola, USA
 * - acquired in 2020
 * Colgate Palmolive (PNG) Ltd - 50/50 joint venture with Colgate Palmolive; inherited from Steamships Trading Company acquisition
 * Swire Foods
 * James Finlay Limited - sells Finlays tea
 * Qinyuan Bakery - baked goods chain
 * Taikoo Foods Limited - distributes food products under the “Taikoo” brand and other brands in China (both Mainland and the Hong Kong SAR); merger between Taikoo Sugar Limited, Taikoo Sugar (China) Limited and Swire Foods Trading (China)
 * - inherited from the Swire Group acquisition
 * The Coca-Cola Company China - a 81/19 joint venture with for manufacturing, production and distribution in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan, formed through a merger of all bottling operations owned by Swire Group within China, Hong Kong and Taiwan
 * Swire Coca-Cola, USA