Will they split? Won’t they? On Tuesday, we finally got an answer to whether Kanye West and Adidas AG would go their separate ways. The sportswear giant said it was ending its almost decade-long collaboration with the musician, now officially known as Ye, after putting it under review earlier this month.
The company said it would terminate the partnership with Ye immediately, end production of Yeezy branded products and stop all payments to Ye and his companies. It will cease the Adidas Yeezy business with immediate effect.
Adidas was too slow to walk away from Kanye’s controversies. It had come under increasing pressure over recent days to drop the star after his comments targeting Jewish people, including a tweet that resulted in Twitter suspending his account. That followed Ye sending T-shirts down the Paris catwalk with the the slogan “White Lives Matter” emblazoned on them. On Friday, Kering SA’s Balenciaga said it had stopped working with West. Late Tuesday, Gap Inc., which last month ended its own collaboration with Ye, said it was pulling all remaining Yeezy Gap products from stores and online.
