Additional reporting by Stephen Aldred and Philip Blenkinsop
Sullivan & Cromwell is advising Anheuser-Busch InBev SA (AB InBev) on its agreement to buy back South Korea’s Oriental Brewery Co (OB) from KKR and Affinity Equity Partners for $5.8 billion, a deal that will be Asia’s biggest ever sale for private equity, excluding flotations.
Simpson Thacher & Bartlett is advising KKR and Affinity Partners, while Kim & Chang is providing Korean law advice for both AB InBev, the world's biggest brewer, and the private equity firms.
Hong Kong-based partner Michael DeSombre and New York partner Frank Aquila are leading the Sullivan & Cromwell team on the transaction.
AB InBev sold OB to KKR for $1.8 billion in 2009. That sale was part of InBev’s efforts to raise money to ease the debt burden from its acquisition of U.S. beer maker Anheuser-Busch a year earlier.
OB, with top-selling lager Cass, has become Korea’s largest brewer with a 60 percent market share. OB, along with Hite Jinro controls 90 percent of Korea’s beer market.
The deal comes a week after Japan’s Suntory Holdings agreed to buy spirits maker Beam Inc for $13.6 billion. Carlsberg, Heineken NV and SABMiller Plc have also struck deals in Asia over the past five years, lured by the region’s $258 billion market that is growing twice as fast as the rest of the world.
Kanishk Verghese is North Asia journalist at ALB. Follow us on Twitter: @ALB_Magazine.
