Olam International Limited, a leading agri-business operating across the value chain in 65 countries, has completed the acquisition of ADM’s worldwide cocoa business at an enterprise value on a cash free and debt free basis of $1.2 billion.
According to Olam, the acquisition meets increasing customer demand for full integration within the cocoa supply chain by bringing together the company’s existing cocoa bean sourcing with ADM’s cocoa processing.
“Olam Cocoa is now a leading, global integrated supplier of cocoa products. This is a transformation of an already strong, prioritized business platform with attractive market prospects that is poised to contribute significantly to Group EBITDA by 2018,” said Sunny Verghese, Olam co-founder, group managing director and CEO.
With the acquisition, the company now operates 12 advanced processing, refining and milling facilities with combined capacity of 700,000 metric tons in the main producing countries of Côte d’Ivoire, Nigeria, Ghana and Brazil, as well as in or adjacent to consumption markets in Europe, USA, Canada and Asia. ADM brands such as the iconic deZaan, plus West African origin brand UNICAO and Latin American brand Joanes will join Olam’s established Macao and Britannia brands.
Olam now has more than 2,400 employees (1,500 of whom joined from ADM) based in a total of 11 producing countries, seven factories, 12 midstream processing facilities, six innovation centers, 20 marketing offices and more than 200 warehouses.
