Macron’s blue aviators spur massive surge in tiny Italian firm

Antonio Vanuzzo and Sabrina Nelson Garcinuño

When French President Emmanuel Macron walked out onto a Davos stage sporting a pair of reflective blue aviator sunglasses, Stefano Fulchir, the CEO of iVision Tech SpA, did a double take.

Almost immediately, orders starting pouring in for Macron’s frames, the brand’s Doublé or Laminé aviators that retail for €659. The attention on the sunglasses garnered almost as much commentary as Macron’s speech in which he blasted US trade policy.

The French president wore the sunglasses after having what he termed a benign but unsightly issue, about which he joked last week in France.

A spokesman for Macron confirmed the glasses were part of Henry Jullien’s brand.

At the same time, investors also rushed to buy shares of the small Italian eyewear maker. iVision Tech shares have jumped more than 70% this week, pushing its market value to €19 million. Shares were suspended for a limit up Friday.

“After Macron’s speech in Davos the website crashed due to the volume of orders,” Fulchir said.

The Doublé Or Laminé aviators were compared online to Tom Cruise’s character Maverick in the Top Gun films, while US President Donald Trump used his own speech to mock Macron for wearing the glasses.

“It all started in the summer of 2024, when we were contacted by the Elysee because Macron had to meet a top official during a G20 and wanted to buy a product made in France for a diplomatic gift and then he bought a pair for himself,” Fulchir said. “We offered to send him a pair for free, but he insisted he wanted to pay for it.”

The company was born in 2020, when the Fulchir family bought a local plant of Safilo, another Italian eyewear-maker. It started producing face masks during the pandemic, then it went back to frames. It acquired Henry Jullien in Sept. 2023 after its IPO in August. The following year, it went on an M&A spree, buying four companies in 2024 alone.

In the future, the company may look at possible acquisitions in China in a bid to develop its smart eyeglasses business, Fulchir said.