Zurich — Nestlé CEO Mark Schneider keeps cutting the sugar and fat. The question is what he’ll add to spur growth at the world’s biggest food company.
Therein lies Nestlé’s conundrum: the maker of Nescafe already enjoys a dominant position in many markets, meaning large purchases would be complicated by competition concerns. Smaller deals won’t move the needle much. But Nestlé is sitting on loads of cash and its current $20bn share buyback programme could be scaled down in the case of sizeable acquisitions. The company also has a 23% stake in L’Oreal that could be sold to finance purchases. Some investors have taken the Atrium deal as a sign Schneider is planning to expand in consumer health.
CFO Francois-Xavier Roger recently signalled that Nestlé could also make acquisitions outside the product segments that Schneider has targeted. At a Sanford C Bernstein conference in September, he pointed to the strong performance of KitKat chocolate and the Maggi soup and seasonings business in emerging markets after being asked whether deal-making activity should be expected to focus on the core categories.