ZAGREB (Croatia), November 27 (SeeNews) – Croatia’s top dairy company Dukat, majority-owned by French Lactalis, said on Tuesday it will take over for an undisclosed sum Macedonia’s largest cheese producer Ideal Sipka in line with its strategy to expand in southeastern Europe.
“Duka, the leading Croatian dairy company in Croatia and the region, and the owners of Ideal Sipka, one of the most important milk production and processing companies in Macedonia, signed on November 23, 2007 a number of deals concerning the takeover of Ideal Sipka by Dukat,” the Croatian company said in a statement.
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The deal is pending the approval of the Macedonian competition regulator and is contingent on certain conditions, Dukat said without elaborating.
Officials of neither company were immedialtely available to comment.
Dukat has production units in Croatia, Serbia and Bosnia, and said it has a 40% marekt share in Croatia. In Macedonia, it is the second largest milk products importer.
Ideal Sipka, set up in 1997, processes some 30 million litres of milk per year. Besides in Macedonia, it sells its products in the United-Nation run southern Serbian province of Kosovo, Albania, Croatia and Australia.