Earnings Express | ANTA Sports is also venturing into AI

Author | XIE Yunzi

Editor | ZHANG Fan

Anta delivered a performance report that is relatively satisfying for the market.

In the first half of the year, the group's revenue increased by 12.9% year-on-year to RMB 43.51 billion, marking the first time that its half-year revenue exceeded RMB 40 billion; the overall gross margin rose by 0.5 percentage points year-on-year to 63.9%; operating profit increased by 16.1% year-on-year to RMB 11.76 billion, with the operating profit margin rising to 27.0%, hitting the highest level of the first half year in nearly seven years.

Lai Shixian, Co-CEO of Anta Group, stated at the performance meeting that all brands delivered comprehensive performance, the growth of Anta brand and other brands exceeded the full-year guidance set at the beginning of the year, and FILA also reached the high end of the guidance range, which once again demonstrated the advantages of the multi-brand portfolio.

CFO Bi Mingwei added that the group continued to maintain sound profitability on a scale of over RMB 400 billion. Excluding the one-off gain brought by the placement of Amer Sports, profit attributable to shareholders was about RMB 7.94 billion, maintaining a double-digit year-on-year growth of 12.9%.

The capital market has given positive feedback.

On the day the financial report was released, the share price of Anta Sports rose sharply, closing at HK$78.75, up 9.53%, with its market value returning to HK$220 billion.

36Kr drew the chart based on Wind data

Screenshot from the financial report

Break down the business performance of each brand.

The revenue of Anta's core brand reached RMB 17.77 billion, up 4.8% year-on-year, operating profit hit RMB 3.99 billion, up 1.2% year-on-year, and the operating profit margin was 22.5%, slightly down from 23.3% in the same period of last year. The reason for the slightly pressured earnings quality is not complicated.

During the reporting period, the core brand made remarkable progress in key categories. Among them, the sales of four running shoe series including PG7, C Family, Mahe and Zone 2 Heart Rate exceeded 5.6 million pairs in the first half of the year, with a year-on-year increase of over 30%. In terms of apparel, the sales of products such as Storm Armor also exceeded 2 million pieces, rising by nearly 35% year-on-year.

Lai Shixian said this shows that the product strategy of Anta's core brand is becoming more focused. "We hope to gradually build clearer consumer awareness of Anta in the professional sports field."

In other words, Anta is increasing the proportion of professional sports products. In this process, the increase in the proportion of e-commerce and direct retail has further squeezed the profit margin.

In July this year, Xu Yang, former CEO of Anta Brand, resigned for family reasons. The 7 store formats he had vigorously promoted, including "Super Anta", "Anta SV" and "Anta Arena", still failed to run through the business model.

As of June 30, the number of stores of Anta's core brand (excluding Anta Kids) was 7122, a decrease of 81 compared with the end of 2025. Lai Shixian emphasized at the performance meeting that the ultimate measure of channel reform is not how many stores are opened, but whether good products can reach consumers more effectively through appropriate channels.

This statement itself can be regarded as a kind of correction to the radical experiments in the past two years. At the same time, overseas business has become the biggest highlight of the core brand.

In the first half of the year, Anta's overseas business revenue increased by 35% year-on-year. According to public information, the group is advancing the "Southeast Asia 1000-Store Plan". In the North American market, Anta has also opened its first flagship store in Los Angeles, and cooperated with mainstream channels such as Foot Locker, DSG and JD Sports.

It should be noted that the high growth of overseas business is based on a relatively small base. The 1000-Store Plan in Southeast Asia also means heavy investment, and there is still uncertainty about the expansion pace and return on investment of Anta's overseas market.

Anta PG7 cushioning running shoe; screenshot from official Weibo account

Now let's look at FILA.

In the first half of this year, FILA's revenue increased by 6.1% year-on-year to RMB 15.05 billion, operating profit reached RMB 4.32 billion, up 9.7% year-on-year, and the operating profit margin rose to 28.7%, 1 percentage point higher than the same period last year.

In the past two years, FILA has been focusing on the "ONE FILA" strategy, deeply cultivating elite sports such as tennis and golf. Against the backdrop of consumption stratification, the simultaneous increase in revenue and profit margin proves the feasibility of this strategy.

Further breaking down the performance of various categories, the apparel business is regaining its position as the growth driver of FILA, among which the proportion of women's apparel increased by 2 percentage points to over 40%.

FILA has always been the representative of "high-end fashion sports". However, for sports brands, footwear business is still an important embodiment of core technology, and FILA's breakthroughs in this regard are still limited.

In addition, the performance growth of "all other brands" represented by Descente and Kolon Sport remains strong. The revenue of this business segment increased by more than 44.2% year-on-year to RMB 10.69 billion, which also exceeded RMB 10 billion for the first time in the half-year report; in terms of operating profit, it reached RMB 3.54 billion, up 43.9% year-on-year.

Apart from the multi-brand layout, Anta's investment in AI may become the most discussed topic in the financial report.

Lai Shixian introduced that the group is advancing the "AI 365" strategy. Its self-developed "Linglong" large design model can convert sketches into design drafts in 15 seconds, and the "Lingxi" outfit matching model has been applied in retail terminals, which can recommend collocations according to scenario requirements and provide virtual fitting services.

In terms of enterprise management, AI is also used to analyze social media and consumption trends to assist market forecasting and inventory management. During the reporting period, Anta Sports' R&D investment accounted for 2.5% of its revenue, ranking at the forefront of the sporting goods industry. In the future, Anta may become more "tech-savvy" from product design to consumer services.

Of course, whether the "AI 365 Strategy" can truly be transformed into improved operating efficiency remains to be verified by time. Lai Shixian himself also said, "We are still in a relatively early stage", "The criteria for measuring whether AI has created value should still be reflected in better products, faster response, healthier inventory and better consumer experience."

When the whole industry enters a downward cycle, these are precisely the key issues that brands need to continuously solve.

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