Unilever Buys Kalina for $700 M

Consumer goods giant Unilever said Friday that it had agreed to buy Russia's largest beauty products manufacturer — Yekaterinburg-based Kalina — for $700 million.  With the Kalina acquisition, Unilever, which has been operating in Russia since 1992, hopes to strengthen its local offering and enhance its presence in the promising Russian market, said the company's chief executive Paul Polman.  The Unilever deal is the latest among acquisitions by big foreign companies seeking to expand their business in the Russian domestic consumer goods market over the last couple of years.  Coca-Cola acquired local juice maker Nidan Soki in September 2010, then rival PepsiCo bought a controlling stake in Russia's biggest juice and dairy producer Wimm-Bill-Dann for $3.8 billion in December of the same year. According to a recent note from Rennaissance Capital, the trend is likely to continue in the future, with alcohol maker Synergy, sea food producer Russian Sea, drug maker Pharmstandard, as well as retailers M.Video, O'Key and X5 Retail Group being potentially interesting for foreign companies seeking to enhance local presence, the note said.

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