ANTA SPORTS (02020) is executing a strategy far grander than simple merchandise sales through its acquisition of Jack Wolfskin, strategic investment in MUSINSA China, sponsorship of 13 Chinese national teams for the Milan Winter Olympics, announcement of a thousand-store plan for Southeast Asia, and establishment of flagship stores in North America. This series of strategic moves is underpinned by the group's robust multi-brand capability of "smart acquisitions, effective management, and strong operations." The Chinese sportswear giant has demonstrated with its above-market operational performance that it seeks not mere linear brand accumulation but the construction of an ecosystem and strategic future aimed at the global industry's pinnacle.
On March 25, ANTA SPORTS released its 2025 performance announcement. The financial report shows the group achieved revenue of RMB 80.219 billion, a year-on-year increase of 13.3%. This growth is equivalent to adding a company with tens of billions in revenue within a single year. In the Chinese market, ANTA Group's revenue scale has reached the combined level of Nike China and Adidas China, continuously widening its lead over international brands. The group has maintained its position as the industry leader in the Chinese market for four consecutive years and remains firmly within the top three globally. According to international authoritative statistics, ANTA SPORTS holds approximately a 21.8% market share in China's sportswear and footwear market (excluding Amer Sports Group). From a global capital market perspective, ANTA SPORTS and Amer Sports consistently rank among the top five global sports brands by market capitalization. Based on the latest share price, ANTA SPORTS' market capitalization has surpassed Adidas to become the world's second largest, while Amer Sports has overtaken lululemon to rank fourth globally.
Notably, ANTA SPORTS leads not only in scale but also sets a benchmark for being "large and strong" in profitability. In 2025, the group's operating profit increased by 15% year-on-year to RMB 19.091 billion, with the operating profit margin rising by 0.4 percentage points to 23.8%. The ANTA brand, FILA brand, and other brands all achieved synchronized profit growth. The group's free cash inflow was RMB 16.106 billion, indicating healthy cash flow performance. As of the end of 2025, the group held a robust net cash position of approximately RMB 31.719 billion, with inventory management maintained at healthy levels, providing substantial support for R&D innovation, channel upgrades, and global expansion.
The multi-brand strategy has advanced synergistically, with differentiated layouts yielding significant results. Adhering to its "Single Focus, Multi-Brand, Globalization" strategy, ANTA SPORTS focuses on smart acquisitions, effective management, and strong operations to build a clearly layered brand matrix covering all scenarios. Through centralized back-office empowerment and independent brand operations, it achieves synergistic effects and value release across all brands. The ANTA brand, adhering to its core strategy of "mass positioning, professional breakthroughs, and brand elevation," saw revenue grow 3.7% year-on-year to RMB 34.754 billion, demonstrating steady progress and outperforming peers. Leveraging proprietary technology, it created a hit product matrix, with PG7 running shoes selling over 4 million pairs annually and the C-family professional running shoes exceeding 1.2 million pairs. ANTA Kids maintained its leading position in the professional children's sportswear market. Channel upgrades through new store formats like Arena, Palace-level stores, and Lighthouse stores improved per-store efficiency, driving growth through efficiency rather than store expansion.
FILA continued to outperform the industry on its large base, with revenue increasing 6.9% year-on-year to RMB 28.469 billion. The brand focused on tennis and golf as core brand associations, launching the "Tennis 360" strategy and expanding its hit product matrix through IP-driven operations. The new tech-driven dad shoe, VETTA, helped the entire dad shoe family sell nearly 10 million pairs for the year, while the Borderless Polo drove sales of 2 million units for the polo category. Store upgrades through flagship stores and immersive experience spaces consolidated its advantage in high-end sports fashion.
Beyond the two core brands, the cluster of other brands, including DESCENTE and KOLON, became the group's most elastic growth segment, with revenue surging 59.2% year-on-year to RMB 16.996 billion. DESCENTE, focusing on professional elite scenarios like skiing and golf, saw annual gross merchandise value exceed RMB 10 billion for the first time, joining the group's portfolio of ten-billion-yuan brands. KOLON Sport became the fastest-growing brand within the group, with impressive store efficiency and same-store sales growth. Jack Wolfskin initiated a global five-year brand revival plan, while MAIA ACTIVE accelerated its incubation in the women's yoga segment. Growth in this segment primarily stemmed from improved store efficiency and operational optimization, highlighting the quality of the growth.
Based on a shared supply chain, a digital mid-office, and a DTC system, the group provides differentiated support to each brand, maintaining independent positioning while sharing back-end cost and technological advantages. This approach truly realizes "acquiring, revitalizing, and strengthening" each brand, paving a sustainable path for high-quality multi-brand growth.
While the domestic foundation remains solid, ANTA SPORTS comprehensively accelerated its globalization efforts in 2025, establishing an International Business Division early this year to oversee overseas operations. This marks an upgrade from product and channel expansion abroad to an integrated layout involving brands, capital, and ecosystem synergy. Southeast Asia serves as the "bridgehead" for globalization, advancing the ANTA brand's "Thousand Stores Plan." In South Asia, a partnership with international retailer Brandman Retail marked the formal entry into the Indian market. The ANTA brand successfully expanded into the Middle East and Africa, covering countries like the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Kenya. In North America and Europe, presence was established through mainstream channels like Foot Locker, DSG, JD Sports, and Amazon, with the first North American flagship store opening in Beverly Hills, Los Angeles, further solidifying its high-end brand image. By the end of the 2025 fiscal year, the group had opened over 460 single-brand stores outside China, transitioning its global network from scattered points to regional depth.
Concurrent with the acceleration of global expansion, ANTA SPORTS' capital operations carry profound strategic significance. In May 2025, the full acquisition of Jack Wolfskin completed its global outdoor portfolio. More recently, the announcement to acquire a 29.06% stake in PUMA SE, becoming its largest shareholder, further opens channels to global mainstream markets. The two parties will achieve efficient complementarity in channels, R&D, and marketing, aiding the group's penetration into mature European and American markets while helping PUMA tap growth potential in China. This signifies the expanding potential for the ANTA model to empower global enterprises. While respecting PUMA's assets and daily independent operations, ANTA aims to stimulate new growth potential for the brand through strategic synergy and complementary advantages, marking a more mature phase in ANTA's globalization journey.
This also indicates that ANTA's globalization is not merely about store openings and mergers and acquisitions, but about exporting its proven operational, digital, and merchandising capabilities from the Chinese market, while integrating global premium resources to feed back into the domestic market, creating a virtuous cycle of mutual empowerment and establishing a replicable, evolvable global multi-brand management model.
Continuous refinement in three core capabilities—R&D, digitalization, and retail operations—underpins ANTA SPORTS' steady growth and global expansion, constituting its unique competitive advantage. In R&D, the group's investment reached RMB 2.2 billion in 2025, more than five times the 2016 level. Cumulative innovation investment over the past decade reached RMB 20 billion, with plans to invest another RMB 20 billion over the next five years. The group has established a global open innovation network, collaborating with 96 universities and research institutions, incubating internationally competitive proprietary technologies like fluoride-free ANTA membrane and Six Degrees Warmth Technology, using product strength to support brand elevation.
Digitalization and AI are fully integrated into the business chain. The group launched the "AI365 Strategy," introducing the industry's first dedicated AI design large model, "Linglong." The strategy covers six key areas: design, supply chain, marketing, retail, and operations, significantly shortening R&D cycles and enhancing operational efficiency. Applications like digital avatar livestreaming, AI customer service, and precision marketing in private domains effectively reduce costs, improve efficiency, and enhance user experience.
The retail end adheres to a DTC model to connect directly with consumers, rapidly capture demand changes, and optimize store structure and experience. From 2020 to 2025, the number of offline stores remained largely stable, while revenue and per-store efficiency continued to rise. This growth model, prioritizing efficiency and operation-centricity, provides ANTA with stronger risk resistance and profitability resilience amidst industry fluctuations.
In conclusion, ANTA SPORTS' solid 2025 financial report fully validates the long-term value of its overall strategic layout. The success of its multi-brand matrix stems from the group's mature integration, operations, and value extraction capabilities. The steady progress of globalization represents the deep implementation of a long-term vision in the global market. Transitioning from acquisition and integration to ecosystem synergy, and from scale expansion to efficiency-driven growth, ANTA SPORTS has charted a unique, high-quality development path for Chinese sports brands that offers lessons for the industry. Looking ahead, as multi-brand value continues to be released, the global network matures, and innovation and retail capabilities strengthen, ANTA SPORTS is poised to further widen the gap with industry followers and persistently drive the optimization and upgrade of the global sports goods industry landscape.
For investors, ANTA SPORTS' core value lies not in short-term performance growth rates, but in its replicable, extensible brand operating system and globalization capabilities. This constitutes the fundamental strength enabling it to navigate industry cycles and steadily advance towards becoming a world-leading multi-brand sports group. As mentioned in a report to shareholders by ANTA SPORTS Chairman Ding Shizhong, "For the next ten, twenty, thirty years, our goal is not to chase periodic rankings, but to build ANTA SPORTS into a world-class enterprise with global influence and sustained value creation capability, delivering long-term well-being for all shareholders and stakeholders."
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