Israel’s SodaStream is about to be picked up by one of the world’s largest beverage producers in a multi-billion dollar deal.
PepsiCo, which produces not only Pepsi Cola but a wide range of snacks, beverages, and other food products ranging from Lipton Teas to Cheetos to Quaker brand oatmeal products, announced Monday morning its plans to acquire SodaStream at $144 a share – a 32% premium over SodaStream’s estimated stock value before the deal.
The total value of the acquisition is $3.2 billion, PepsiCo said.
SodaStream, which was initially based in the town of Mishor Adumim, east of Jerusalem, relocated across the Green Line in 2015 to pre-1967 Israel following boycott threats, laying off some 500 Palestinian Authority residents it had employed.
The Israel-based company is best known for its home carbonation units, which allow consumers to carbonate their own water or soft drinks. SodaStream’s home carbonation units have competed with beverage producers like PepsiCo, allowing consumers to produce carbonated drinks on demand at a fraction of the price of traditional soft drinks.
PepsiCo chief financial officer Hugh Johnston told CNBC that the acquisition would give his company access to the growing market of home-made beverages.
“We get to play in a business, home beverages, where we don’t play.”
"SodaStream is highly complementary and incremental to our business, adding to our growing water portfolio, while catalyzing our ability to offer personalized in-home beverage solutions around the world," PepsiCo's president, Ramon Laguarta, said in a statement.