Yahoo Finance Recaro, Famed Sports Seat Supplier, Has Reportedly Filed Bankruptcy
Recaro Automotive has filed for bankruptcy, as first reported by Autocar.
The German automotive seat supplier has been approved for self-administration, but it's unclear how that will affect the brand's future.
Recaro was bought by a U.S.-based private investment company back in 2020.
Recaro has filed for bankruptcy. The company, which has supplied seats to various car manufacturers for decades, was yesterday approved for self-administration by a German court, per a report by Autocar.
It's unclear how the filing will affect Recaro, who provides sports seats for brands such as BMW, Ford, the VW Group, and others. The seat maker's employees were unaware of the bankruptcy, according to Autocar, who also reported that the IG Metall trade union that represents 215 workers at Recaro's factory in Kircheim unter Teck, Germany, has demanded transparency from the supplier's upper management.
Back in January 2020, Recaro Automotive announced that it had sold its business to Raven Acquisitions LLC, which is a privately owned investment corporation based in Detroit, Michigan. At the time, Recaro reported that it had made approximately $150 million in revenue in 2019, and it said that the new ownership would allow the company to prioritize making seats "with shorter and faster decision-making processes allowing greater flexibility to better meet the requirements of the market." It's currently unclear what went astray.
Recaro's history dates back to 1906 when "master saddler" Wilhelm Reutter began designing and building car bodies and interior components. In 1965, Recaro launched its first sports seat, and then in '67 it introduced the first road-legal full shell seat. Future innovations would include a seat with speakers in the headrest (1977), the Recaro A8 sports seat with a plastic backside (1989), and it would go on to make the first retrofit seat with a universal side airbag in 2004 followed by designing a seat with a new lightweight composite shell in 2005.
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