San Miguel set to go on AsPac investment binge

Food and beverage giant San Miguel Corp. will expand its presence in seven Asia-Pacific countries by next year in efforts to gear itself as a major player in the entire region, chairman and CEO Eduardo Cojuangco said.

He said among the countries where the food and beverage conglomerate plans to invest in include China, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, Vietnam, Cambodia, and Australia.

"We have definite plans in each of these countries," Cojuangco said."We believe our investments in these countries will help our operations overall, especially in beer, so there will be synergies with what we already have," he added.

SMC already has existing brewery operations and packaging presence in several of these countries, although it will be the first time the company would be venturing into Thailand, Malaysia and Cambodia.

Its flagship beer brewing operations presently span China, Hong Kong,Indonesia and Vietnam while its Australian operations is through its subsidiary J. Boag & Son Ltd. Its packaging and glass manufacturing business, on the other hand, has been spread out into China and Vietnam.

Earlier, it was reported that SMC was considering putting up a $200-million brewery in Taiwan, in addition to plant facilities for its softdrinks, bottled water and juice products.

A subsidiary, San Miguel Packaging Products, is also looking at building two glass plants in Australia – one in Brisbane and the other in Sydney – to complement the China and Vietnam operations serving the Asia-Pacific market.

SMC said the two new plants will initially provide for the glass requirements of Australian beer makers J. Boag and Lyon Nathan, a 40-percent owned company of Japan’s Kirin Brewery Co. Ltd. which, in turn, recently bought a 15 percent stake in SMC.

"Now that we have strengthened our position in the domestic market, we will continue to pursue our goal of becoming a major regional player," Cojuangco said.

He added the total investments in the countries where they will be expanding will be spread out over seven years, with financing to be sourced through a combination of internal funds and debt.

He added that the investment foray would be open to partnerships with local entities, although he stressed SMC prefers to gain the controlling shares in these potential investments.

"We don’t mind having partners... but insofar as San Miguel is concerned, yes, it has to be a majority. If not, you lose the purpose of investing" he said.

SMC said it expects to meet its full year targets for 2002, boosted by the continuing favorable performance of its various business lines.

Its consolidated revenue is seen to hit over P140 billion, 16 percent more than last year while net income of about P7 billion will post an 11 percent jump from the previous year.