Brazilian food company BRF Brasil Foods and Irish ingredients firm Carbery have formed a 50/50 whey processing joint venture in Brazil, with a proposed investment of $50m.
The new joint venture will use Carbery's technology to process whey produced at BRF's cheese manufacturing facilities.
The deal is expected to complement BRF's cheese division in Brazil, while allowing Carbery to expand its ingredients business in South America.
Carbery CEO Dan MacSweeney said that producing whey protein ingredients in Brazil will strengthen Carbery's offerings to the leading nutritional brands there, and position the company for further growth.
"Furthermore, by growing our presence in emerging markets like this, Carbery is adding value to its core business in Ballineen, Ireland, and our other international facilities, in a steady and planned way, while demonstrating our ability to compete and succeed in world markets, using world-class process technology," MacSweeney added.
BRF CEO Jose Antonio Fay said that the joint venture is in line with the company's plan to expand the cheese segment, primarily with the Sadia brand.
"The increase of cheese production will generate whey which will be further processed in order to extract the full value-added potential of the segment," Fay said.
As part of the joint venture, the companies will set up a manufacturing plant that will utilise whey to produce nutritional ingredients, which will be used by consumer brands in baby food, sports nutrition and other segments.
Construction of the facility is scheduled to be begin immediately and it will be commissioned in 2014.
BRF has 14 dairy plants in Brazil and one in Argentina, which process over 1.6 billion litres of milk per year.
The company's dairy product range includes cheese, UHT milks and fresh dairy products, which are sold under Batavo and Elege brands.
Carbery, headquartered in Cork, Ireland, manufactures ingredients, flavours and cheese for food and drink companies.
The company has been operating in Brazil since 2007 through its Synergy flavour and taste business, and in October 2012 it opened a new flavour manufacturing and technical development centre in Sao Paolo, Brazil.
