With the UB Group's ability to sell and market brands, Whyte & Mackay will be taken to a new level again. Vijay is a world-class businessman with honor, integrity, flair and a great instinct for business. After months of being fodder for whisper columns, United Spirits Limited (USL), the flagship of the United Breweries (UB), led by its charismatic Chairman and the beer baron, Vijay Mallya, is again in the limelight. In his usual astutely majestic style, Mallya acquired 100% in Glasgow-based Scotch giant Whyte & Mackay (W&M), the world's fourth largest Scotch maker. The historic £595 mn ($1.18 bn) acquisition of W&M, which boasts of producing nearly 10% of the world's Scotch whisky, gives Mallya a first-mover advantage in an industry where success is determined by mindspace. Whatsoever, the deal came at the right time for USL and for India Inc. which is increasingly making its presence felt in the global arena and has immediately sent the shares of USL to vault by 7% on the NSE, thereby gaining $2 bn in terms of market capitalization.
The acquisition now makes the UB group the world's second largest liquor maker and plugs a `missing link' in the UB's product portfolio by giving the company the strong presence it needed in the Scotch whisky market. USL always had the volume behind it. In 2002, it joined the league of global top five players by acquiring 85% stake in Triumph Distillers & Vintners, and displaced Bacardi, the world's largest privately held and family-owned spirits company, from the fourth slot a year later. Following the acquisition of Shaw Wallace from Chhabria family in 2006, the company climbed to the third slot next only to the world's largest multinational beer, wine and spirits companies, UK-based Diageo and France-based Pernod Ricard. |
