It ’s a cruel world. Because PepsiCo, the company that unites a snacks and a soft drinks business under its roof, has for the past five years underperformed in stock price, operating margins and earnings growth compared with its peers, an “activist” investor in PepsiCo, Nelson Peltz, on 20 February 2014 sent a letter to its board that once again put pressure on the company to consider a spinoff of its beverage business.

Coca-Cola partnering with a coffee roaster? They couldn’t get Nespresso, so they bought a stake in the U.S. company Green Mountain instead? Wrong guess. The transaction, which was announced on 10 February 2014, has got nothing to do with hot drinks. It’s all about cold drinks in capsules. Coca-Cola will pay USD 1.25 billion (EUR 913 million) for a 10 percent stake in coffee roaster Green Mountain in order to expand Green Mountain’s “Keurig Cold” capsule system globally.

Chicago’s Goose Island brewery was only the first. In its effort to expand its range of craft beer (or “crafty”) offerings, AB-InBev has agreed to buy the Blue Point Brewing Company, famous for its Toasted Lager brand. The deal was announced on 5 February 2014.

Take it as a sign that competition among craft brewers is heating up that, since December last year Boston Beer, the brewer of Sam Adams beer, and California’s Lagunitas brewery have been engaged in a slugfest. For Jim Koch, the founder of Boston Beer, this row cannot have come at a worse time as in 2014, Boston Beer celebrates its 30th anniversary.

Innoval Döhler, based in Mexico City, became fully integrated into the Döhler Group in January 2014. The Mexican company Innovación Alimentaria was founded in 1992 by Gustavo León and renamed Innoval Döhler as the German ingredient specialist acquired 40 percent of the company back in 2006.

Together with Krones AG, Neutraubling, Germany, Brazil’ s second-largest brewing conglomerate, Grupo Petrópolis, privately owned and headed by proprietor Walter Faria, has now built two new breweries with a capacity of six million hl each. The first of the two production facilities had already gone into operation during late 2013, in Alagoinhas near Salvador de Bahia, following around one year of construction work, right on time for the 2014 World Cup in Brazil. The second facility, in Itapisuma near Recife in the state of Pernambuco, is scheduled to start up in mid-2014. This represents massive expansion for the group into the north of Brazil.

“They might as well have bombed the harbor [Pearl Harbor] again. This is a sad, sad day for America” was one of the less than kind comments on U.S. social media after news broke on 13 January 2014 that Japan’s Suntory is acquiring U.S. spirits company Beam Inc for USD 16 billion including debt. Beam Inc owns brands like Jim Beam, Maker’s Mark, Canadian Club whisky and Courvoisier cognac.

Corona’s previous Mexican owners should be tugging their forelocks. Their previous partner and now owner of Corona in the U.S., the wine-to-beer company Constellation Brands, has shown that Corona does very well on draught.

That’s courageous. Kirin plans to produce its Ichiban Shibori draft beer in Brazil as of March 2014, Japanese media report. The Japanese probably hope to benefit from increased demands for beer forecasted for the 2014 World Soccer Cup to be held in the country.

According to a new analysis by the Brewers Association (BA), small and independent American craft brewers contributed USD 33.9 billion to the U.S. economy in 2012 – this corresponds to a 17 percent growth of the craft brewing market.