The joint venture will combine PepsiCo-owned beverage manufacturing and distribution operations in Mexico with those of GEUSA, the other Pepsi bottler in Mexico and a subsidiary of GEUPEC.
Empresas Polar, the largest food and beverage company in Venezuela and a longtime leading bottler of Pepsi-Cola products in that country, will have an equity stake in the joint venture.
The joint venture will offer Mexican consumers and retail customers a strong portfolio of carbonated and non-carbonated brands including Pepsi, Gatorade, 7UP, Lipton, Mirinda, Santorini, Squirt, Electropura, ePura and BeLight throughout the country. The broad scope of its distribution network will reach 950,000 points-of-sale and to 1.7m households with its direct-to-home delivery system.
Juan Gallardo, chairman of GEUPEC said: “We are confident that the strong partnership between GEUPEC, Empresas Polar and PepsiCo will represent great growth opportunities, make us more competitive and innovative, and allow us to provide excellent service to our customers and consumers.”
“This new business model will allow us to create synergies and streamline our supply chain,” said Pepsi Beverages Company CEO, Eric Foss. “We’ll also be quicker, more agile and better able to meet the changing demands of today’s consumers.”
GEUPEC will initially maintain a majority interest in the joint venture, whose governing board will include representatives of the three equity partners. Miguel Antor, CEO of Pepsi-Cola Venezuela, a unit of Empresas Polar, has been designated CEO of the new joint venture. This transaction is subject to approval by the Federal Competition Commission of Mexico and is expected to be completed by the end of September 2011.
Source: PepsiCo
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