For over a year there has been a persistent rumour that Carlsberg, in tow with Brooklyn Brewery, would establish some sort of presence in the Baltic country of Lithuania. On 11 July 2017 Carlsberg confirmed that it will invest about EUR five million (USD 5.7 million) in a line of new exclusive beers in Klaipeda, home of its Svyturys brewery.

Carlsberg’s executives probably think they made a bargain when they snapped up the London Fields, which has been up for sale since its founder was charged with tax fraud, cheating the taxman out of more than GBP 700,000 (USD 914,000).

Market research seems to suggest that to many drinkers the company behind the pint does not matter. However, the Society of Independent Brewers (Siba) begs to differ. The usually good-natured trade body for Britain’s smaller brewers “has turned from mild to bitter”, writes the Guardian newspaper on 11 July 2017, following Carlsberg’s takeover of the London Fields brewery.

Funny that they kept quiet over this transaction for more than six months. Only in early July 2017 did the family-owned brewer Duvel Moortgat admit to have taken a 35 percent stake in the Italian craft brewer Birrificio del Ducato, although the deal was already clinched in December 2016. No financial details were provided.

No wonder they could buy all those breweries: Duvel Moortgat set record results in 2016. Its turnover exceeded EUR 400 million for the first time. Since it left the stock exchange in 2013, the company’s turnover and profits more than doubled, media reported at the end of June 2017.

Following the publication of the article “Protests against patents on brewing barley” on this website in June 2017, we received a rejoinder from someone who should know what this is really all about. The Australian agricultural scientist Dr Evan Evans, a noted barley expert, wrote back saying that patenting of genes that occur naturally is not “quite cricket”.

With the Brexit talks now underway, the British Beer & Pub Association (BBPA) has come out in its support for the approach outlined by leading industry groups, to ensure that, alongside the brewing and pub industry’s existing priorities, robust transitional arrangements are in place as the UK prepares to leave the European Union.

It was only a matter of time, after some obscure hints, before AB-InBev would kick off the process of selling its German beer brands Hasseröder and Diebels.

The silly season must be upon us or why would the Mexican Tequila Regulatory Council (CRT) threaten to sue Heineken over its Desperados lager now? The tequila flavoured Desperados beer has been around for 20 years, having been developed by the Heineken-owned Fischer brewery in France in the 1990s.

With horse-drawn beer carriages, oompah music and free beer about 100 activists protested on 7 June 2017 outside the European Patent Office in Munich against a patent on barley. According to the Munich-based alliance “No Patents on Seeds”, both Heineken and Carlsberg lay claims to the proprietorship of a certain brewing barley, the resulting brewing process and the finished product. As they say, the barley originated from accidental mutations of genetic material.