European Commission Clears Arla’s Acquisition of Hansa

The Commission’s examination of the proposed transaction showed that the activities of Arla and Hansa are largely complementary since Hansa's activities focus on fresh dairy products, and the German market, where Arla has only limited activities.

4/4/2011 --- The European Commission has cleared under the EU Merger Regulation the proposed acquisition of Hansa-Milch Mecklenburg-Holstein, by Arla Food amba. Both Hansa and Arla are dairy cooperatives that produce and sell a variety of dairy products. After examining the operation, the Commission concluded that the transaction would not significantly impede effective competition in the European Economic Area (EEA) or any substantial part of it.

Arla is a leading dairy cooperative owned by Swedish and Danish dairy farmers and is active in the production and sale of a variety of dairy products, in particular in Scandinavia and the UK, but also worldwide.

Hansa is a German dairy cooperative with a more regional focus and supplies mainly fresh dairy products, longlife milk, butter and milk powder.

The Commission’s examination of the proposed transaction showed that the activities of Arla and Hansa are largely complementary since Hansa's activities focus on fresh dairy products, and the German market, where Arla has only limited activities. Only in Denmark and Sweden the transaction leads to horizontal overlaps in the markets for butter, cream and longlife flavoured dairy drinks. However, the market investigation showed that a sufficient number of alternative suppliers exist since customers are able to procure from a wider geographic area. As a result, the transaction leads to rather modest market shares which do not raise competition concerns.