Since outgoing adidas Group CEO Herbert Hainer shared last August on an investor call that the company was looking into selling TaylorMade Golf, Adams Golf and/or Ashworth, the rumor mill has been very active in predicting when any of all of these brands would be sold and who would be buying them.
Rumored buyers have ranged from the predictable -- Acushnet's Korean owners to Under Armour, assuming they'd want to get into the hard goods game -- to the more obscure, including the China-based Wanda Group, which has not been shy about acquiring American-based assets, including AMC movie theaters. These rumors have flared repeatedly through the fall only to never prove true.
The rumor mill began working again on Sunday night, with multiple websites, including My Golf Spy, suggesting a sale had already been made through multiple social media channels.
However, on Monday, TaylorMade CEO David Abeles reassured employees in an internal email, obtained by Golf News Net, that the company has not been sold.
The message reads in part:
If in the event you are fielding questions, internally or externally, regarding this tweet, feel free to insure those who inquire that TaylorMade has NOT been sold.
In fact, the adidas Group has never been more supportive of our business (including all of the momentum that has been created by our teams) and shares the same optimism that we all do relative to our TMaG business in 2016 and beyond.
We will continue to set the record straight regarding our ownership and business. This is another opportunity for each of us to demonstrate leadership and continued confidence in the remarkable progress we are making as a company -- a strong and healthy TMaG is good for golf.
Abeles' message is consistent with what he shared on a Golf Magazine podcast last week.
"Because of some of the realities that have been reported about golf, our parent company simply wanted to look at the category and ensure it was a growth category for them moving forward," he said. "I'm proud to say their support of TaylorMade-Adidas Golf has never been stronger."
For its part, My Golf Spy published an article on Monday suggesting their sources lead them to believe "no deals are imminent, although we wouldn't be the least bit surprised to see adidas totally divest itself of all 3 brands within the next 6-12 months."
