Pepsi India To Be Part Of New Asia Division

The Pepsi operation in India will now be part of a new Asian division of PepsiCo Beverages International formed by the merger of PepsiCola International, Tropicana and Gatorade, the sports beverage company acquired from Quaker Oates. PepsiCo Beverages International is a division of PepsiCo Inc.

Earlier, India was one of the eight business divisions of the beverage company that used to report to PepsiCo International in New York directly. Now it will report to PepsiCo Beverages International Asia in Hong Kong.

While these business units will continue to function as profit centres, they will now be consolidated within one of four new geographical divisions that have been set up.

PepsiCo Beverages Internatio- nal, which is based in New York, has recast its international operations into four key regions: Asia, including Asia-Pacific, China and India: Europe, comprising Europe and sub-Saharan Africa and Tropicana Europe, Latin America, comprising Mexico, South America and the Caribbean; and Middle East, comprising the Middle East, North Africa and Pakistan.

PepsiCo Beverages International Asia will be headed by Ron McEachern, who currently heads Pepsi's Asia-Pacific business unit, based in Hong Kong. The new division president will be reporting to Peter Thompson, President of PepsiCo Beverages International, based at PepsiCo Inc's headquarters in Purchase, New York.

The move has been prompted by the need to give greater regional focus to new products like Tropicana and Gatorade so that they become a key element of the overall portfolio of the US beverage major.

As a result of these changes, Tropicana will cease to remain a separate division in India reporting to its headquarters in the US and will be merged within the Pepsi operation in India. And the Gatorade beverages will be launched by the existing beverages team in India and not through another division.

PepsiCo, which recently acquired Quaker Oates, also picked up Gatorade, a sport drink that had been earlier acquired by Quaker.

Pepsi India is already working on a strategy to launch a bevy of Gatorade products in the country by the end of this year. That apart, it is also planning to give a major thrust to the juice business through the launch of a host of new products under the Tropicana brand name.