Primo Water has also entered the Canadian 18-litre purified bottled water exchange market through the acquisition of certain assets of Culligan of Canada.
The Canadian acquisition represents Primo’s second transaction with Culligan, following its acquisition of Culligan’s self-serve filtered drinking water refill business in November 2010.
Primo Water has acquired certain assets of Omnifrio, which mainly consist of appliance and intellectual property related to single-serve, carbonated beverages, flavour cups (S-cups) and CO2 canisters used with the appliances to make a variety of cold drinks.
The acquisition of Omnifrio positions Primo Water in the $39bn US market for carbonated beverages. The company plans to integrate the Omnifrio carbonation and single-serve cold-beverage technology into some of its water dispenser appliances to develop multi-beverage hydration stations for both household and office use.
Omnifrio has several patent applications pending for its carbonated beverage makers. It has developed over 30 flavours of S-cups with three carbonation levels.
Primo expects to begin selling cold carbonated beverage appliances and flavour cups to specialty and catalogue retailers in the US in the fourth quarter of 2011.
Billy Prim, Primo’s president and CEO, said: “This should enhance our ability to add innovative beverage and hydration solutions to our line of water dispensers and convert more households into Primo consumers.
“This technology combines two of the fastest-growing beverage categories: carbonation systems and single-serve beverages. Additionally, we plan to offer two add-on consumables: S-cups and CO2 cylinders for exchange.”
Source: Primo Water Corporation
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