InBev said on July 01, 2008 that it remains committed to its proposal to create the world’s leading beer company through an acquisition of all the outstanding common shares of Anheuser-Busch Companies Inc. at $65 per-share in cash, representing an immediate premium of 35% over the unaffected share price and a premium of 18% over the previous all-time high in October, 2002.

Carlos Brito, Chief Executive Officer of InBev, said:

“Our firm proposal of $65 per share reflects the full and fair value of the company. The proposal is backed by fully committed financing, and provides immediate certainty of value in a weakened stock market environment. Our firm proposal was rejected in favor of a newly formulated management plan with significant execution risks.

In addition to guaranteeing immediate value for Anheuser-Busch shareholders, our proposal is predicated on an established track record of international expansion and consistent growth in profitability. This combination would create a stronger, more competitive global company with an unrivaled worldwide brand portfolio and distribution network, as well as unmatched economies of scale in a period of rapidly escalating commodity prices. It would provide unparalleled opportunities for consumers, employees, wholesalers, business partners and communities.

Given the seriousness of our firm ...More Info

PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC), the firm of accountants, expects pub closures to accelerate beyond its own predictions as the smoking ban and consumer squeeze tighten their grip on the sector, The Publican communicated on June 30.

The firm believes 6,000 pubs will close in the next five years if they “do not take definite steps to address the impact of the ban and squeeze on consumer spend”, with 2,000 of these closing this year alone.

PWC said it was revising its 2007 prediction of 5,000 pub closures by 2012 after 1,200 had shut for good last year, double the 700 closures in 2006.

Martin Jervis, partner, Advisory at PWC said now was the time for pub owners to “take a long hard look at their businesses and make some difficult decisions around their future strategy”.

Jervis said companies should “recognise loss-making trends early and deal with them in the appropriate way, for example through sale or closure”.

Meanwhile a Cancer Research study has revealed that 400,000 people in the UK have quit smoking a year after the ban. The charity estimates 40,000 lives have been saved by the legislation.

The smoking ban was introduced throughout the UK on 1 July 2007, when England came into line with public ...More Info

As from today the excise taxes on alcohol increase almost 3.5 per cent in New Zealand.

DB Breweries, which produces Tui, Monteith's and Heineken, will raise prices by an average of 5.5 per cent for a pack of beer and 5.3 per cent for tap beer.

Lion Nathan, producer of Speights, Lion Red, Mac's and Steinlager beer, will also raise prices by an average of 5.5 per cent.

Spirits and ready-to-drink beverages will also reportedly rise, by around 5.3 per cent.

A slightly smaller price hike faces wine drinkers - wine sold by Lion Nathan, which includes Wither Hills, will rise by approximately 4 per cent.

DB Breweries do not produce wine.

Liquor companies are blaming commodity prices for the price increases, saying the cost of malt has soared 50 per cent in the past year.

Hospitality Association of New Zealand chief executive Bruce Robertson said the industry had been reluctant to apply the price increases because of the stretch in the dollar but they "don't have a choice". "We've had significant other increased costs: rent, energy, labour costs - we need to recover that" he said.

Manurewa MP George Hawkins said he didn't think the price increase would have very much impact at all. "To have a ...More Info

R. C. Agu, T. A. Bringhurst and J. M. Brosnan

Abstract
J. Inst. Brew. 114(1), 62–68, 2008 Studies carried out on normal husked barley, normal hull-less (naked) barley, acid dehusked barley and acid dehusked hull-less barley, as well as the malts derived from them, showed that when acid dehusked barley samples (obtained from either husked or hull-less barley), were processed using commercial enzyme preparations, they produced more alcohol when compared with the alcohol yield obtained from the barley samples from which the acid dehusked samples were derived. When the husked (Optic) control, acid dehusked and hull-less barley samples were malted, Optic control barley produced malt that gave higher dextrinising units (DU) and diastatic power (DP), whilst acid dehusked Optic and hull-less barley produced malts that gave similar DU results on day 5 of the germination time. When mashed, acid dehusked (Optic) barley malt produced wort that filtered faster than the wort obtained from the malt made from hull-less barley. This observation is very important because it shows that the husk of the barley is not the only factor that determines the filtration performance of the malted barley, since both the malt samples made from husked and acid dehusked barley had similar filtration rates on day 5 of the germination time. The slow filtration rate observed for the wort made from hull-less barley suggests that other factors play some role during the filtration of the mash made from hull-less barley malt. Although hull-less malt appeared to develop lower DU and DP enzyme activities, when compared with the values obtained for the Optic control, hull-less barley malted faster and produced optimum predicted spirit yield (PSY) at day 4 of the germination time. In contrast, the control husked Optic barley malt that had higher DU and DP produced equivalent (optimum) predicted spirit yield one day later at 5 days germination time. This is an advantage for hull-less barley, both in terms of time and energy saving during the malting of barley. Although the acid dehusked Optic barley produced more alcohol than the husked control when commercial enzyme preparation was used to process barley, it was surprising that when the derived malt was assessed, it gave a lower predicted spirit yield than the husked control, even though it produced a higher amount of hot water extract (HWE). The higher extract yield and lower predicted spirit yield obtained from the malt made from acid dehusked malt confirmed that high extract yield is not necessarily associated with high fermentable extract. Key words: Alcohol yield, acid de-husked barley, barley, diastatic power, dextrinising unit, filtration rate, hull-less barley. ... Load full article, 6 pages, 1504 Kb, PDF file