Japanese firm in deal for In-Bev’s European beers
ASAHI Group will pay $7.7-billion (R105-billion) for AB In-Bev’s beer assets in five emerging European countries, its biggest overseas deal yet as the Japanese brewer expands its presence on the continent.
The takeover – also the largest by a Japanese beer company – includes popular Czech beer Pilsner Urquell and other businesses in Hungary, Poland, Romania and Slovakia.
In April, Super Dry maker Asahi said it would buy the Peroni and Grolsch brands from the world’s top brewer, AB In-Bev, clearing the way for the Belgian company’s monster takeover of Britain’s SAB-Miller.
The European businesses that Asahi said yesterday it was buying were formerly owned by SAB-Miller before it became part of AB In-Bev, which owns Corona, Beck’s, Budweiser and Stella Artois.
As part of that mega-merger deal, European regulators had demanded AB In-Bev sell the Peroni and Grolsch brands, and divest SAB-Miller’s Eastern European business.
Asahi also picked up UK-based craft brewery Meantime, as part of the earlier deal.
“The target business is highly compatible with our existing business in western Europe and will strengthen our business platform, allowing Asahi to grow sustainability across Europe,” the Japanese brewer said.
But investors dumped Asahi’s Tokyo-listed shares in response to a report on the acquisition from Japan’s leading Nikkei business daily.
The paper said Asahi would pay roughly $7.7-billion for the units, about twice as much as it had said in an earlier report in October.
The stock dived 4.6% before the deal was officially confirmed.
Nobuyuki Fujimoto, a senior market analyst at SBI Securities in Tokyo, said: “The shares were down over concerns about the price. But in the longer term it could be a good strategy since Japanese brewers need to be in foreign markets to survive.”
Asahi has long been a minnow abroad, with only about 12% of its annual sales from overseas consumers.
It is best known abroad for a beer brand called Super Dry, which debuted in 1987 at the height of Japan’s boom years, before a stock market and property crash ushered in a slow economic decline.
Japanese firms have been shopping overseas to counter a shrinking market at home and have faced a slump in beer sales.
Asahi rival Kirin has said it was acquiring a 25% stake in New York’s Brooklyn Brewery, to tap into the global popularity of craft beers.