Philips and Swarovski partner to bring a range of innovative fashion accessories

 

Paris, France/Amsterdam, TheNetherlands – Fusing lifestyle, technology and fashion, Philips announced today a new partnership with the world famous crystal and jewellery company Swarovski.  The alliance combines Philips leadership in bringing innovative consumer lifestyle electronics products with Swarovski’s expertise in creating fashion crystal jewellery and handbags collections to produce meaningful fashionable accessories for women.

 

Leveraging both companies’ strengths, Philips and Swarovski have jointly designed and developed a range of new and unique products that will take technology to a new, fashionable level for women. The Philips and Swarovski alliance will develop new market opportunities for each company by integrating high fashion and technology.

 

The first fashionable innovations created by Philips and Swarovski are the Active Crystals range of products which will be launched this summer includes sound accessories and storage devices.

 

"Philips alliance with Swarovski combines two distinct and strong brands in order to create a unique proposition for consumers,” said Rudy Provoost, Chief Executive Officer, Philips Consumer Electronics. “The outcome of the alliance is a range of products that go back to the essence of what many women are looking for: The fusion of functionality and fashion through a unique combination of technology and elegance. We are combining luxurious design with the practical, everyday benefits of consumer electronics to complement Philips’ brand promise "sense and simplicity" and Swarovski brand promise of Poetry & Precision".


Combining Simplicity and Poetry of Precision

The new range is the first result of the Philips and Swarovski alliance focusing on providing performance and class, offering technology with style and demonstrating a feeling of movement and activity combined with fashionable innovation. Targeted towards fashion conscious women, the products combine the technologies of both companies to create unique, high-end products with a luxurious look and feel.

 

“The Philips and Swarovski alliance brings together the greatness of two companies with common values of uncompromising focus on quality, design and technological innovation,” said Daniel Cohen, Member of Swarovski’s Executive Board.  “Both brands have distinct identities, rich histories and a passion to re-invent and enhance their value propositions, pursuing both brand repositioning and commercial goals. The result of this partnership will be a series of products that will provide women and consumers with meaningful and fashionable products that will enhance their lives.”

 

Swarovski is a well-known brand in the fashion and jewellery industry. It brings credibility, style and design to the alliance and an opportunity to create a unique product proposition with Philips. Unlike other products using the Swarovski crystal stones, the Active Crystals combine unique elements of functionality and fashion: truly jewels with a soul.


A limited collection will be available for a June sneak preview at Colette, the concept store in Paris. The full Philips and Swarovski Active Crystals range will be commercially available in Europe, North America and Asia in department stores/consumer electronics retail and in the Swarovski stores as of August 2007.

 

Specific product details, pricing and availability will be announced over the coming months.

For more information, please contact:

Natasha Konstantinova

Philips Consumer Electronics Communications Department
Tel:  +31 20 59 77677   
Email:  natasha.konstantinova@philips.com


Celia Aklil

Swarovski
Tel:  +33 1 42 56 24 77   
Email:  celia.aklil@swarovski.com


About Royal Philips Electronics

Royal Philips Electronics of the Netherlands (NYSE: PHG, AEX: PHI) is one of the world's biggest electronics companies and Europe's largest, with sales of EUR 30.3 billion in 2004. With activities in the three interlocking domains of healthcare, lifestyle and technology and 161,100 employees in more than 60 countries, it has market leadership positions in medical diagnostic imaging and patient monitoring, color television sets, electric shavers, lighting and silicon system solutions. News from Philips is located at www.philips.com/newscenter


About Swarovski

112 years ago, in 1895, Daniel Swarovski I, a Bohemian inventor and visionary, moved to the village of Wattens, Tyrol in Austria, with his newly-invented machine for cutting and polishing crystal jewellery stones. From these beginnings, which revolutionized the fashion world, Swarovski has grown to be the world’s leading producer of precision-cut crystal, for fashion, jewellery and more recently lighting, architecture and interiors. Today, the company, still based in Wattens, family-owned and run by 4th and 5th generation family members, has a global reach, with some 20,000 employees, a presence in over 120 countries and a turnover in 2006 of 2,37 billion Euros. Swarovski comprises two major divisions, one producing and selling loose crystals to the industry and the other creating design-driven finished products. Swarovski crystal components, known by their product brand names CRYSTALLIZED™ – Swarovski Elements for fashion and STRASS® Swarovski® Crystal for architecture and light, have become an essential ingredient of international design. Showing the creativity that lies at the heart of the company, Swarovski’s own-brand lines of accessories, jewellery and home décor are sold through more than 1150 Swarovski stores and concessions in all major fashion capitals, while the exclusive Daniel Swarovski accessories collection has become the company’s Couture signature. The Swarovski Crystal Society has close to 400,000 members worldwide, keen collectors of the celebrated crystal figurines. And in Wattens, Crystal Worlds, the multi-media crystal museum, has attracted over 7 million visitors since it was opened in 1995, as a celebration of Swarovski’s universe of innovation and inspiration, of crystal as the ultimate creative material. The Swarovski corporation also includes four industrial brands, Tyrolit®, manufacturing grinding tools, Swareflex, for road safety reflectors, Optik, producing precision optical instruments and Signity, Swarovski’s brand for genuine and created gemstones. Illuminating Fashion and Culture, Home and Leisurewww.swarovski.com.