Jenner sells stake in beauty empire to CoverGirl owner

NEW YORK (AP) — Kylie Jenner is selling a stake of her beauty business to CoverGirl owner Coty, in a deal that values the reality TV star’s company at about $1.2 billion.

Coty said Monday that it will pay $600 million for a 51% stake in Kylie Cosmetics. It plans to launch more products under the Kylie brand and sell them in more countries around the world. The deal is expected to be completed early next year.

Jenner, part of the “Keeping Up with the Kardashians” reality show family, founded her company in 2015, tapping into her hundreds of millions of social media followers to promote her popular lip liners and liquid lipsticks.

The 22-year-old, who is the youngest sister of Kim Kardashian West, will still be the face of the brand and be involved in creating new products.

“Kylie is a modern-day icon,” said Peter Harf, Coty’s chairman of the board.

Coty hopes that the celebrity-backed business can help boost its sales and connect with younger shoppers under 35, a group that traditional makeup brands have struggled to reach. Coty’s other brands, including Max Factor makeup and Sally Hansen nail polish, have been around for decades.

Wendy Nicholson, an analyst at Citi Research, said that the deal could help Coty become a “faster growth company.” But she said a brand attached to a celebrity comes with risks, like the possibility that Jenner’s popularity could fade.

Coty said Monday that Jenner “is not a fad,” citing her brand’s growing sales and social media followers. Kylie Cosmetics brought in about $177 million in revenue in the last year, up 40% from the year before, the company said. And the brand’s Instagram followers grows by 7,000 a day.

Lawsuits by Michael Jackson accusers likely to be restored

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A California appeals court appeared strongly inclined Monday to give new life to lawsuits filed by two men who accuse Michael Jackson of repeatedly molesting them when they were boys.

Three judges from the 2nd District Court of Appeal said in a tentative ruling that lawsuits from James Safechuck and Wade Robson against two corporate entities that Jackson owned should be reconsidered by the trial court that dismissed them in 2017.

Robson, 37, and Safechuck, 41, who became known to a broad audience when they aired their accusations earlier this year in the Emmy-winning HBO documentary “Leaving Neverland,” sat together in a downtown Los Angeles courtroom during Monday’s brief hearing.

Outside, their attorney Vince Finaldi said the decision was the right one, and they are pleased.

“All they’ve ever wanted is their day in court,” Finaldi said.

The suits filed in 2013 that were dismissed because statutes of limitations had expired can be revived because of new state law signed last month by Gov. Gavin Newsom that gives those who say they were sexually abused until age 40, up from age 26, to file lawsuits. It also gives victims of all ages a three-year window to sue, starting Jan. 1.

The tentative decision does not revive the actual Jackson estate as a defendant. A 2015 decision throwing out that part of the lawsuit will stand. The remaining defendants are the two corporate entities, MJJ Productions, Inc., and MJJ Ventures, Inc.

Attorneys for Jackson’s estate accepted that the cases must be returned to the trial court under the new legislation, but emphasized that the ruling is unrelated to the allegations they have long denounced as demonstrably false.

“This new law extends the time for genuine victims of abuse to file legal claims,” Jackson estate attorney Howard L. Weitzman said in a statement. “The appellate court’s tentative ruling is not on the merits of Robson and Safechuck’s allegations and the court in no way said that these cases will go to trial. Neither does it reverse the 2015 rulings dismissing Robson and Safechuck’s claims against the estate, which are final and no longer subject to any appeals. We are confident that the claims against Michael Jackson’s corporate entities will, once again, be dismissed as has happened before.”

Robson testified in Jackson’s 2005 criminal trial, in which the singer was acquitted, that Jackson had never molested or mistreated him, and Safechuck once said the same to authorities investigation Jackson, who died in 2009.

The men and their attorneys have said that stress and trauma that persisted into adulthood finally led them to accept that they had been sexually abused and go public.

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Follow AP Entertainment Writer Andrew Dalton on Twitter: https://twitter.com/andyjamesdalton.