American giant PepsiCo is in talks to take over the group that holds the Pepsi franchise for Romania - Quadrant Amroq Beverages (QAB), according to market sources. Quadrant's shareholders have repeatedly negotiated the company's sale to Pepsi over the past few years, but talks have now reached the stage of financial and juridical audit, the quoted sources say. However, the price issue has not been settled yet. The business is estimated at several tens of millions of dollars.
The four companies - QAB, Sitaco, Sigat and Perla are controlled by an American businessman - Alain Coasa and an investment fund owned by businessman George Soros and managed by Sierra Quadrant. According to the above-mentioned sources, the fund owns 25-30% in the group.
Sierra Quadrant officials could not be contacted for comment. "I cannot comment on this information," said QAB general manager Mihai Matyas. "We get frequent visits from PepsiCo, as we are their authorised bottling company, but I cannot comment on this information," he said.
If it is finalised, this would be the second-largest transaction on the Romanian market of soft drinks, after the deal closed between Coca-Cola and Dorna last year, when the US company took over Dorna mineral waters. The Americans paid 39 million euros to take over Dorna, to gain a foothold on this market segment.
QAB was licensed by Pepsi in 1991, after it formed a joint-venture with Flora factory. The QAB portfolio has become more diverse in the meantime, coming to include, besides the Pepsi products, brands such as Prigat, Kick, and Perla. This year, the company teamed up with Unilever South Central Europe (USCE) and became the bottling company for Lipton Ice Tea.
In its twelve years on the Romanian market, QAB has invested more than $80m in the business, according to Matyas. Although it was operating in Romania even before 1989, Pepsi lost ground to archrival Coca-Cola after the Revolution. Coca-Cola made bigger investments - more than 400 million dollars.
Coca-Cola came to Romania in 1991, through three franchisees, among which Greek investors (Molina group) and Turkish businesspeople (the Ozgorkey group).
These investors eventually merged (in 1999 and 2000), so that now there is only one Coca-Cola bottling company on the Romanian market, Coca-Cola Hellenic Bottling Company (CCHBC), with five factories.
On the other hand, the group behind the Pepsi business has one soft drinks and mineral water plant in Bucharest and is building another factory, in Covasna, where it has invested seven million dollars. The Covasna-based plant is now 20% completed and will be ready next year, according to Matyas.
claudia.covaci@zf.ro ; laurentiu.ispir@zf.ro
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