Asahi Group Holdings Ltd. is paying a hefty premium for the business that owns Czech lager Pilsner Urquell, extending a pricey deal-making spree by Japanese companies eager to find new growth overseas.
The company's bid for SABMiller Plc's eastern European assets beat the next-highest offer by about €800 million ($834 million), people familiar with the matter said, asking not to be identified because the process was private.
Japanese companies pay higher premiums on average than their counterparts in the rest of the world, bidding aggressively in overseas deals that will help them diversify away from a shrinking population at home. Buyers from the country paid an average premium of 33 percent this year for foreign assets, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That compares to a global average of 22 percent, the data show.
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