Tata Tea on Thursday said it was aggressively looking for acquisition opportunities in the United States and the company was in talks with a number of prospective companies.
"We have initiated dialogues with a number of prospective companies. However, talks are still in the discussion stage and nothing specific or concrete has materialised at this point. . . it would be premature to comment on timeframe," Tata Tea managing director P T Siganporia said in a statement.
However, the company had not divulged any further details on the proposed brand acquisitions. It was reported that the company is close to buying two mega tea brands of US, which could cost around $100 million each.
"We are constantly scanning the environment to look at opportunities for step change growth through mergers, acquisitions, strategic alliances in the area of business will complement our portfolio operations," Siganporia said when enquired about possibility of taking over the US specialty tea brand -- Good Earth.
The company is looking at strengthening of specialty tea segment and herbal tea which is growing very fast. In the last three years it had grown by 50 per cent in the United Kingdom and 8 per cent in US, double the growth in regular tea.
If the US takeover plan of the company fructifies then it will be a much larger deal than its previous international brand acquisition -- Tetley.
The Tetley deal had cost the company $475 million. The company had already taken the shareholders approval for such new acquisition.
In the last AGM on August 9, Tata Tea chairman Ratan Tata had said the overseas acquisition would be funded by cash balances held with the firm.
Tata Tea recently had launched its brands in South Africa and was looking at the market in a conscious manner.
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