The new owners of the cosmetics and perfumery manufacturer Dzintars - Skinest Group - have started hiring employees so that the factory can start working again at the end of the month. The first products of this renovated company will be available in stores in mid-November. Meanwhile, the expenses of the insolvency proceedings of JSC Dzintars have already reached 1.137 million euros, of which 906 thousand euros have been paid. By September 1, creditors had received only 1.3 percent of their requests.
The insolvency of Dzintars had cost 906 thousand euros by August 31. Of which 118 thousand euros has been the administrator's fee, 59 thousand euros have been paid to invited specialists, another 264 thousand euros have been paid in taxes. About 440 thousand euros have been spent on various services, such as waste removal, communications, electricity, security, etc. All these costs are mostly covered by the debtor's funds.
The total recognized claims of Dzintars' creditors exceed 17 million euros, including the total amount of unsecured creditors' claims of 13 million euros, secured - 4 million euros. By August 31, unsecured creditors had been paid 224 thousand euros. Most of the money was received by former employees of Dzintars. However, this amount paid to former employees is only about a third of what the company owes them. In total, Dzintars had more than half a million euros that hadn’t been paid to its employees.
However, the requests of secured creditors, including the State Revenue Service, had not yet been satisfied. In fact, the debt of JSC Dzintars to the state still exceeds 9 million euros, the Public Relations Department of the State Revenue Service confirmed to Neatkarīgā.
Skinest Group, the new owner of Dzintars, which bought Dzintars' assets for 5.5 million euros, has started hiring employees to resume production in October, as promised. Anastasija Udalova, a member of the council of Daugavpils Locomotive Repair Plant, told Neatkarīgā that the company does not even have to make a special effort to find employees, because many previous employees of Dzintars apply for jobs. Neatkarīgā also checked that currently there are no advertisements about job opportunities in Dzintars on the vacancy and job seekers' portals.
Anastasia Udalova expressed confidence that the factory will really resume work in the second half of October and that in the middle of November the cosmetics and perfumes produced in the renovated factory will be available in stores.
However, litigation regarding Dzintars’ trademarks is still pending. An entry in the court calendar shows that on October 28, the Riga City Vidzeme District Court will continue to hear the claim of the insolvent cosmetics manufacturer Dzintars against the former owner and manager of the company Iļja Gerčikovs for invalidation of transactions and restoration of property rights to trademarks.
Skinest Group acquired the assets of Dzintars together with 93 trademarks. Litigation is pending for 5 trademarks.
Neatkarīgā already wrote that the former manager of the company and the true beneficiary Ilja Gerčikovs last year, several months before the company's insolvency, re-registered the Dzintars trademarks in his own name. In the opinion of Jānis Ozoliņš, the insolvency administrator of Dzintars, the trademarks of Dzintars were granted to Ilja Gerčikovs without a just reason, therefore a lawsuit was filed with the court regarding the return of the trademarks to the company.
Seven days after the insolvency administrator Mareks Diks submitted an application for declaring Dzintars insolvency to the Riga City Pardaugava Court, Ilja Gerčikovs registered a new company Dzintars Beauty. However, the registration of this trademark has been refused for the time being, according to the information available in the database of the Patent Office of the Republic of Latvia.
Production in Dzintars was stopped almost a year ago. In August of this year, Dzintars' assets were acquired by Ritrem, which is part of the Skinest Group, and its parent company is Daugavpils Locomotive Repair Plant, which employs more than 600 people in Latvia. Skinest Group sees great potential in Dzintars' past activities in both research and development and manufacturing. "People both in Latvia and elsewhere are waiting for the return of Dzintars, and it will happen, there is no doubt about that. The company is in good hands, and we have enough capital to ensure that the company receives all the investments necessary for its development,” said millionaire Oļegs Osinovskis, owner of Skinest Group, after the transaction was approved.
A lawsuit is still underway in Latvia, regarding the case of bribery of the former head of Latvijas dzelzceļš Uģis Magonis, in which O. Osinovskis is also involved.