Flick Gocke Schaumburg advises the sole shareholder of lit.COLOGNE GmbH on a strategic partnership with DEAG Classics AG

Flick Gocke Schaumburg has advised the sole shareholder of lit.COLOGNE GmbH on a strategic majority acquisition by DEAG Classics AG, a wholly owned subsidiary of DEAG Deutsche Entertainment Aktiengesellschaft.

Managing Partner and co-founder Rainer Osnowski will remain on board as a shareholder and Managing Director and continue to run the company in the long term together with his team. The two partners expect the cooperation to produce synergy effects in the development of new formats as well as in the acquisition of new venues and in the ticketing business.

Advisors to the lit.COLOGNE GmbH shareholder: Flick Gocke Schaumburg (Bonn)
Partner: Dr. Stephan Göckeler; associate: Alexander Heinen (both M&A/corporate law, Bonn)

lit.COLOGNE GmbH was founded in Cologne in 2000 and quickly reached an ever-growing audience from its first festival onwards. With up to 200 events and its own program for children and teenagers (lit.kid.COLOGNE), lit.COLOGNE is now one of the largest literature festivals in Europe with more than 100,000 visitors. Many stars from Germany and abroad have been guests at the festival, including T.C. Boyle, Bret Easton Ellis, Susan Sonntag, Karl Lagerfeld, Daniel Kehlmann, Jonathan Franzen, John Irving, Juli Zeh, Henning Mankell, Patti Smith, Herbert Grönemeyer, Matthias Brandt, Iris Berben, Charles Aznavour, Doris Lessing and Christoph Waltz. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, lit.COLOGNE was successfully staged as an online festival for the first time in 2021, with a total of 54 events.

DEAG Deutsche Entertainment AG (DEAG) is a leading entertainment service company and provider of live entertainment in Europe. DEAG group companies are active in 14 locations in the core markets of Germany, the UK, Switzerland, Ireland and Denmark. As a live entertainment service provider with an integrated business model, DEAG has extensive expertise in designing, organizing, marketing and holding events.<<<