Carlsberg A/S, the famous Danish brewing company, has won a 2.38 billion yuan (US$348 million) bid to acquire an additional 12.25-percent in Chongqing Brewery Co., Ltd., a beer producer and distributor in China, from the beverage company Chongqing Beer (Group) Co., Ltd.

According to a notice published by Chongqing Brewery on Friday, the company signed an agreement with Carlsberg Hong Kong on Wednesday: Chongqing Beer (Group) plans to transfer its 12.25-percent equity stake, or 59.29 million shares, to Carlsberg Hong Kong, at 40.22 yuan (US$5.89) per share.

After the equity stake is transferred, Carlsberg's stake in Chongqing Brewery Co., Ltd. will increase to 29.71 percent (including a 17.46-percent stake in Carlsberg Chongqing), becoming the biggest shareholder of Chongqing Brewery. With a 20-percent stake in Chongqing Brewery, Chongqing Beer (Group) will become the second-biggest shareholder.

The stake purchase at such a high price is mainly due to the strong competition from Anheuser-Busch InBev NV and China Resources Snow Breweries, who also submitted bids for the stake. The former is the biggest beer enterprise in the world, and the latter is one of the three main beer companies in China.

Another reason for the high price is the value of the hepatitis B vaccine program of Jiachen Biological, a subsidiary company of Chongqing Brewery. According to a report from HuaChuang Securities, it is very possible that a new drug certificate will be issued for its synthetic peptide vaccine, and the vaccine is expected to be listed on the market in 2014.

Based on a rough forecast, the vaccine will bring about 500-million-yuan (US$73.2 million) income, including a 200-million-yuan (US$29.28 million) net profit in one year after being listed. An annual 30-percent growth rate is expected for the next 10 years after being listed, with dozens of billion yuan (a few billion US dollars) of revenue generated.

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