In one go, Carlsberg has disposed of its stakes in both Türk Tuborg and Israel Beer Breweries for a total of USD 116 million. The buyer is the Israeli CBC Group, a Coca-Cola franchisee, who was Carlsberg’s partner in Turkey and Israel.

Diageo, the world’s biggest alcoholic drinks company and owner of Guinness and Johnnie Walker whisky, is in talks to acquire a 30 percent stake in Cobra Beer, the private Indian-themed lager company, for about GBP 25 million to GBP 30 million.

Having tried their hand at brewing, Coca-Cola Amatil’s next project is to get involved in the dairy industry. The soft drink company will release a range of Goulburn Valley flavoured milks in Adelaide in September and then nationally, after trial marketing in Western Australia.

Following the resignation of Foster’s CEO in June, the board’s decision in July to appoint one of its directors, Ian Johnston as acting CEO says two things. One is that the board is now firmly in control of the day-to-day management of the group and the other is that it is not going to rush the search for a permanent CEO.

With Foster´s Group and Lion Nathan now enjoying 95 percent of Australia´s beer market, growth by acquisition of new customers is limited and thus company performance depends heavily on the configuration of the “value chain” with regard to deployment of resources and delivery of products to customers.

In May the alcohol beverage industry in Australia continued to be subjected to increasing pressures from legislators, the community and the media as concerns the problems caused by excessive consumption of alcohol.

Australia´s former conservative leader John Howard was awarded the country´s highest honour in the Queen´s birthday awards list. The list released on 9 June 2008 includes awards of the Medal of the Order of Australia (AM) to a brewing industry notable: Dr Timothy J Cooper of the Coopers Brewery in Adelaide.

Anyone volunteering to break up Foster´s wine and beer business? Amid all the razzmatazz surrounding the InBev takeover attempt of Anheuser-Busch, the resignation of Foster´s CEO Trevor O´Hoy at the beginning of June has almost gone unnoticed.

Baltika buys Baku-Castel

Too late. Although Efes CEO Alejandro Jimenez made some ominous remarks at the Canadean Madrid conference in April that Efes was planning further acquisitions in the former Soviet Union states, Efes was beaten to the pole by its Russian rival Baltika when it came to clinching a deal with the French-owned Baku-Castel brewery in Azerbaijan.

A specialist wine school, the Sydney Wine Academy, has been established at the Ryde College campus of the TAFE Northern Sydney Institute.