可口可乐与百事可乐的较量

Is red copying blue? Coca-Cola, like PepsiCo last year, is to bring its North America bottling operations in-house. Pitching such a change in strategy after almost 25 years as an evolution would be hard at the best of times, even if it wasn't following the example of a hated competitor. But timing ultimately does not matter. What is important is that Coke continues to fix its dysfunctional organisation, and appears prepared to do more.

Buying in its North American operations should improve the Coke system as a whole – the relationship between central recipe holder and marketeer, and the collection of companies bottling Coke's fizzy drinks. The region is unique both because of its maturity (fizzy drink sales are not growing), and because Coke developed its soft drink, juice and fountain businesses separately from bottler Coca-Cola Enterprises. Adding CCE's bottling and distribution should produce cost savings – $350m annually are targeted – and improve returns as part of Coke's ambitious plan for doubling system revenues by 2020.

But CCE is getting the better end of the deal. Shareholders will get $10 in cash, plus a new CCE share in exchange for their old one. Assuming a multiple of seven to eight times earnings before interest, depreciation and amortisation for the new business, that suggests a price in the $28-$32 per share range, versus the $20 it has traded at for the past month.

Coke, however, raises the contribution of North America from 23 per cent of total sales to about half, diluting its emerging market exposure. The $12.6bn enterprise value it is in effect paying for the business – a combination of surrendering its $3.4bn stake in CCE and assuming net liabilities of $9.2bn – is over eight times ebitda, more than what Pepsi is paying for its bottlers, where the cost-saving opportunity is greater. Improving the system comes at a cost.

红方在模仿蓝方？和去年的百事可乐(PepsiCo)一样，可口可乐(Coca-Cola)将把北美装瓶业务收归麾下。纵使不是在效仿可恶的竞争对手，可口可乐要在近25年后通过实施这样的战略转变来促进发展，就算是在形势最好的时期也很困难。但说到底，时机无关紧要。重要的是可口可乐继续整顿其功能失调的组织结构，而且似乎准备采取更多动作。

收购北美业务，应会改善可口可乐的整体架构，改善核心配方持有者和销售者与所有可口可乐碳酸饮料瓶装企业之间的关系。北美地区之所以独特，一是因为其成熟度（碳酸饮料销售停止增长），二是因为可口可乐的软饮料、果汁和矿泉水业务与装瓶商Coca-Cola Enterprises (CCE)是独立经营的。并入CCE的装瓶和分销业务，应会节约成本（目标是每年3.5亿美元），提高效益。可口可乐的雄心是到2020年实现总销售额翻一番。

但这笔交易中占上风的是CCE。股东每持一股旧股将可换得一股CCE新股，外加10美元现金。假设新企业的市盈率为利息、折旧与摊销前利润(EBIDA)的7倍至8倍，那么股价应在28至32美元之间，而CCE在过去一个月的股价在20美元左右。

不过，可口可乐把北美在总销售中的贡献从23%提高到50%左右，使新兴市场的贡献相应缩减。可口可乐实际上向CCE支付了126亿美元的企业价值——包括放弃在CCE的34亿美元股权，以及承担92亿美元的净债务——为息税折旧摊销前利润(EBITDA)的8倍以上，超过百事收购其装瓶业务的代价，而后者实现成本节约的机会更大。改善自身架构要付出高价。