MillerCoors LLC might keep the “Miller” portion of its name, but the company’s ownership ultimately will likely all fall under the “Coors” umbrella through a pending merger of the world’s two largest brewers.
London-based SABMiller PLC, which includes Miller High Life, Pilsner Urquell and Foster’s among its brands, has accepted the latest purchase offer from Leuven, Belgium-based Anheuser-Busch InBev NV, the maker of Budweiser, Corona, Beck’s and other beers. That pending sale, announced Tuesday, is valued at around $106 billion.
The transaction would be among the world’s largest corporate mergers. The two companies together have 224,000 employees in more than 100 countries, with that head count likely to be reduced as the merged company cuts costs.
The enlarged Anheuser-Busch InBev could control up to 31% of the global beer market — if antitrust regulators allow the sale to proceed without any changes.
However, it is expected that neither the U.S. Department of Justice nor the Federal Trade Commission would approve the merger without requiring SABMiller to sell its 58% share of Chicago-based MillerCoors, said Scott Hansen, an antitrust attorney at Reinhart Boerner Van Deuren, a Milwaukee law firm.
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