76 acquisitions in September

Quite a slowdown in September. 76 food and drink transactions were recorded on the Zenith Global mergers and acquisitions database. The lowest month of the year so far.

They weren’t that big either. Just one was above $500 million, though two more topped $400 million.

• $1,000 million in ingredients for France’s Ardian private equity to buy a majority of Florida Food Products from US private equity MidOcean
• $485 million in US packaging for Silgan to purchase Gateway Plastics
• $453 million in ingredients for Dutch DSM to gain control over US based First Choice Ingredients.

Of the 76, 8 were in ingredients, 8 in plant-based, 6 in alcohol, 6 in packaging, 6 in soft drinks, 4 in dairy and 4 in snacks.

New categories are becoming increasingly important. In addition to 8 plant-based, there were 6 in free from dairy, meat or alcohol, 3 were in vertical farming, 2 were in CBD, 2 were in cell-based and 1 was in insects – totalling 22.

41 were within individual countries, 30 of these in the United States, 5 in the United Kingdom and 3 in France. 35 were international, involving 24 countries.

Overall, the United States featured in 47, the United Kingdom in 14, France in 11 and the Netherlands in 3.