Brussels, 09/02/2000 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission authorised the merger of the bottling activities between Coca-Cola Beverage and Hellenic Bottling Company, under condition that Hellenic sells its holdings in Frigoglass, making the beverage coolers used to present the drinks in shops. The operation will place Hellenic under joint control of its mother company, Kar-Tess (Greece) and of Coca-Cola Company (United States) and will make it a designated Coca-Cola bottling company.
Hellenic bottles soft drinks and other non-alcoholic drinks in Greece, in Northern Ireland and certain eastern European countries. Coca-Cola Beverage, whose headquarters are in the United Kingdom, bottles its drinks in Austria, in Italy and also in several eastern European countries. The Commission feels that the parties' activities will complement each other geographically and that there are no competition problems.
On the other hand it has noted that the merger could lead to a locking in the beverage coolers market, to the extent that the Frigoglass competitors could be prevented from selling beverage coolers to other bottling companies distributing their Coca-Cola products. Therefore the Commission called on the parties to sell the 20% stake held by Hellenic in Frigoglass before authorising the operation.