AB-InBev’s Belgian owners diversify their portfolios
Are we “past beer”? Some investors clearly think that in the brewing industry heady deals are a thing of the past, and seek to put their money elsewhere. Having done nicely out of AB-InBev’s generous dividend pay-outs, two Belgian shareholders of AB-InBev, the families de Spoelberch and de Mévius, have taken to investing their spoils into other industries.
Their investment vehicle, Verlinvest, holds stakes in several dozen companies, many of them belonging to the food and beverage sector, Dutch media report. But Verlinvest also owns stakes in technology and e-commerce firms, both in Europe and in Asia. Since last year it is one of the shareholders in the learning app, Byju’s, an Indian “unicorn” (that is a tech company with a value of more than USD 1 billion).
Among its other investments, Armonea stands out. Armonea is the largest operator of nursing homes and residential care centres in Belgium. Through acquisitions it has become a large operator in Europe too. Half of the group is owned by Verlinvest, media say.
However, Verlinvest’s company rooster must be considered small fry compared with the Belgians’ investment in coffee. It was Alexandre van Damme, another Belgian behind AB-InBev, and the de Spoelberchs, who persuaded some of their wealthy Belgian friends to spend EUR 1.5 billion on building a coffee empire. It’s been estimated that the bulk of the money – EUR 1.25 billion (USD 1.4 billion) – came from Mr van Damme.
According to media, van Damme and the de Spoelberchs are co-investors in a coffee group that the German investment firm JAB (set up by the German Reimann family) has put together over the past few years. With the acquisition of, among others, the Dutch coffee firm Douwe Egberts, Germany’s Jacobs, and US firm Keurig Green Mountain, JAB has established a group with a turnover of more than EUR 10 billion.
The Belgians’ investment vehicle is the Luxembourg company Colufa. Allegedly, Mr van Damme holds 77 percent of Colufa, the de Spoelberchs 10 percent and the other families share the remainder, it was reported.
