Chiquita Fyffes EU - The European Union has approved the merge between Chiquita Brands International, the American producer and distributor of bananas and Flyffes, the Irish brand of Bananas and other fruits. These two would become the largest banana company in the world together.
Chiquita Brands International is an American company that has its headquarters in Charlotte, North Carolina. According to the article they have posted today on the subject of the combination between the two brands, Chiquita has admitted that they have revenues of $3 billion dollars and employs around 70,000 people, functioning in 70 countries.
On the other hand, Fyffes is an international importer and the headquarters are in Dublin, Ireland. They work in Europe, USA, Central and South America and recently, in Asia as well. The employees they have are close to the number of 12,000 people worldwide.
Both companies are extremely excited for this combination and have said on the matter, "This regulatory clearance represents a significant milestone for our proposed transaction to create the #1 banana company globally... we have worked closely with the European Comission to address any concerns, and today's decision reaffirms our confidence that the combination of Chiquita and Fyffes is a natural strategic partnership, one that is now assured of a clear timeline to completion before the end of the year."
Chiquita and Fyffes seem to have great ambitions and to make them happen in little time. Not everything was so simple, though, and they did have to commit to certain regulations with EU.
They have to eliminate any exclusive shipping that they might have with third-party providers and to not impose any sort pre-closing requirements between companies, among other things.
All in all, it seems that this combination between both companies will create mostly benefits and greater plans even in a future for two important members in the industry.
One last detail is that Chiquita will relocate its headquarters to Ireland, as ABC News has noted and they both compromised not to look for similar agreements for a period of ten years.
