Nestlé will transfer its North American ice cream business to a joint venture it owns with another company in a $4 billion deal.
Ownership of Nestlé’s ice cream brands, which include Häagen-Dazs and Drumstick, will shift to Froneri, a joint venture that Nestlé established in 2016 with PAI Partners, a Paris-based private equity firm. Froneri already owns the Nestlé ice cream business in Europe and Israel.
Froneri had revenue of $2.88 billion in 2018. Nestlé’s North American ice cream sales in 2018 came to $1.8 billion.
“The creation of Froneri has been a phenomenal success,” Nestlé CEO Mark Schneider said in a statement. “We are now making this business our global strategic partner in ice cream and are convinced that Froneri's successful business model can be extended to the U.S. market. With this transaction, we are taking a decisive step towards our goal of achieving global leadership in ice cream.”
