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In the face of declining demand for alcoholic beverages in Japan the Tokyo-based Asahi Group is projecting a $ 1.29 billion profit for 2017, a record high largely due to beer brands acquired from AB InBev, and an extremely hot summer in Europe.
Strange times when a Japanese beer conglomerate reaps huge profits abroad on brands like Italy’s Peroni while the growth its flagship brand, Asahi, slows in its homeland…but that’s the international beer biz nowadays.
In early 2009, Asahi Holdings acquired 19.9% of Tsingtao Brewery from Anheuser-Busch InBev in a $667 million deal.
As of January 2014, Asahi was the largest of the four major beer producers in Japan with a 38% market share followed by Kirin Beer with 35% and Suntory with 15%.
In April 2016, Anheuser-Busch InBev agreed to sell Grolsch Brewery, Italy’s Peroni Brewery and England’s Meantime Brewery to Asahi furthering its reach into Western Europe.
Then after acquiring SABMiller in October 2016, AB InBev SA/NV agreed to sell the former SABMiller Ltd. business in Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and Romania to Asahi for $7.8 billion deal.
And it was beer brands such as Pilsner Urquell, Tyskie, Lech, Dreher and Ursus that were acquired in in that 2016 deal with AB InBev, combined with a scorching summer in Europe, that were largely responsible for Asahi’s record 2017 earnings.
