Coke Bottlers May Take Pie

Coca-Cola India, which had bought out the assets of its several franchisee bottlers through negotiated deals over the past five years, is back to doing business with the same bottlers once again.

Some of these bottlers are also likely to subscribe to the private placement of equity that Coca-Cola has proposed to make to bring down its shareholding in its beverage bottling arm from 100 per cent to 51 per cent in keeping with a commitment made to the government in 1997, when it sought approval to buy out the very same bottlers.

According to a senior executive in Coca-Cola, several key bottlers such as M Manekkam of Tamil Nadu, the Salujas in Jammu and the Aggarwals in Bhopal have already signed fresh contracts with the beverages firm to co-pack the latter