PARIS - The French fashion group Pierre Cardin said on Monday it would sell its textile and accessories licences in China to two Chinese enterprises for 200 million euros (280 million dollars).

Founder Pierre Cardin, who will be 87 July 2, told AFP the group had been negotiating the sale to the Chinese companies of 32 licences for the past two months, adding that a sales contract would be signed "imminently."

A Cardin spokesman identified the two companies as Jiangsheng Trading Company and Cardanro. He said Pierre Cardin currently has around 800 licenses in 140 countries.

Earlier on Monday, the group had denied a Chinese media report that it was preparing the sell off the overall brand. "This is not about the sale of the Pierre Cardin group," a spokesman told AFP. "

The couturier is in talks with Chinese companies only on the sale of certain licences in China, as it was in the past for Japan for example."

A newspaper in southern China, the Shenzhen Commercial Daily, had reported on Monday that the Jiansheng Trading Company in Guangdong province had offered 200 million euros (280 million dollars) to buy the brand and hoped to tie up a deal within a month.

Pierre Cardin arrived in China in 1978 and was one of the first Western fashion houses to enter the nation after Beijing embarked on economic reforms and opened up to the outside world.