D&M, Circuit City May Be in Play
By Mark Fleischmann April 22, 2008 — When acquisition talk gets started, you never know whether it'll result in a sale, but there's talk of two major realignments in the consumer electronics industry. First of all, D&M Holdings may be on the block. And second, Blockbuster is thinking of buying Circuit City. Whew! Someone get me a handkerchief.

D&M is of course the owner of Denon, Marantz, Boston Acoustics, Escient, McIntosh, and Snell. The current owner, investment capital firm RHJ International, is looking to flip its 49 percent share of D&M stock, and Philips has agreed to pony up another 12 percent. That would give the prospective buyer a voting majority.

Harman International has exited the bidding process, which is probably a good thing, because it's hard to imagine all those new brands coexisting with Harman's current ones without a huge and unhealthy concentration of ownership, possibly including some consolidation. Remaining bidders include Bain Capital, the owner of Kenwood, and Best Buy, which would form a combination retailing and manufacturing colossus. Would the latter idea sit well with the other retailers currently selling D&M brands? Probably not.

Meanwhile, Blockbuster Inc. has been publicly contemplating the idea of buying Circuit City. Analysts are not high on the idea—they say combining the two ailing mega-retailers may distract them from their core businesses. The ultimate victor, some say, may be Netflix.