New Cinelli and Columbus Owner Pledges to Restore Brands

Milan, Italy

Italian heritage brands Cinelli and Columbus are part of a business takeover by a US company with its roots in fashion and reputation for building and restoring brands.

Asobi Ventures this month confirmed it has now acquired 100% of Gruppo Srl, which includes Cinelli and Columbus – two brands with a combined history of more than 160 years.

“Our family and our teams look forward to bringing Cinelli back to its leadership position as a house of innovation, design, and technology while blazing new trails in urban culture,” Asobi Ventures proprietor Victor Luis says in a statement issued by the company.

“Since 1919, Columbus has held a unique place in Italian industrial history as a manufacturer of high-tech precision tubing, as a luxury furniture brand and as supplier of high-performance proprietary steel alloys and tubing to the world’s finest bicycle brands and independent artisans and craftsman.”

Victor is credited with building and restoring a number of prominent fashion brands in North America, Europe and Asia.

Asobi Ventures previously acquired a majority in Gruppo last June 2021 and appointed a former CEO of several large companies, Marcello Segato, as Grupp Srl’s CEO.

Following this month’s completion of the purchase, he said Gruppo faced “an exciting challenge … to grow these unique brands to a global scale in our core and new categories while remaining true to the legacy of our founder Cino Cinelli and the Colombo family and its guardian Antonio Colombo.”