Notification of Acquisition of Australian Industrial Use Chocolate Manufacturer

The Fuji Oil Group is aiming to expand and develop its chocolate business as part of the reinforcement of core competences that form the fundamental approach to its midterm management plan entitled “Towards a Further Leap 2020”.
With a size of approximately 25 million, the Australian industrial use chocolate market is small in comparison to other countries in the Asia and Oceania region, yet as the region’s fourth largest market it is very attractive given the high final product price resulting from the country's high per-person GDP and the fact that Australia has one of the highest rates of industrial use chocolate consumption in the Asia and Oceania region due to chocolate confectionery, bread, cake and other such foods being firmly rooted in the country as a result of its widespread European culture.
Furthermore, given the fact that the new stipulations in the Australian Consumer Law to be enacted from July this year mandate the indication of the percentage of raw materials produced in Australia on the label of most manufactured products, the ability to produce and supply Australian chocolate in Australia will be a significant strength in terms of B to C manufacturers.
Australians also have a keen awareness of health and the country itself is a leader in terms of taking the environment into consideration, meaning the market has a proactive demand for the kind of traceable and sustainably produced palm oil that the Fuji Group is aiming to provide, especially the high quality palm oil produced by the Fuji Oil joint venture UNIFUJI. For these reasons, and given that an overall synergy with the Fuji Oil Group’s existing oils and fats business can be expected, the decision was made to acquire the shares in IFS.
Henceforth, the Fuji Oil Group will aim to strengthen IFS by introducing the Fuji Oil Group’s specialist oils and fats technology to improve chocolate functionality and implementing standardization for raw materials procurement while selling the Fuji Oil Group’s products to the wide range of customers that constitute the Australian market through the introduction of the Group’s other product lineups and other such actions. Fuji Oil will keep the management structure overseen by the current management who thoroughly know IFS, and work to maximize the synergy with the Fuji Oil Group.

* This summary is planned at the time of release and may be subject to change in the future.

The impact on consolidated results for this term will be slight.