(June 3): Nestlé SA is taking full control of ready-to-drink meal maker yfood Labs GmbH, bolstering the company’s push into faster-growing brands.
The Swiss foodmaker, which acquired a 49% stake in Munich-based yfood in 2023, is buying out founders Noel Bollmann and Benjamin Kremer, the company said Wednesday in a statement, confirming a Bloomberg News report. Terms weren’t disclosed.
The deal values yfood at around €450 million (RM2.08 billion), people familiar with the matter said earlier, asking not to be named discussing confidential matters.
The brand, whose bottles are known for their “This Is Food” large lettering, now also sells shakes, powders, bars and bowls across about 30 European countries, generating annual revenue of nearly €150 million in 2025.
Nestlé’s move is the first acquisition under CEO Philipp Navratil, who took charge in September with a plan to streamline operations and promote brands and categories more likely to be in demand in the coming years.
Although yfood is well known in Europe, there is significant scope for it to expand in the US, one of the largest markets in the world for meal-replacement products, the people said. What once started there as a market for dieters wanting slimming shakes has grown into a diversified category offering consumers a wide range of specialised products.
In 2022, Nestlé bought a majority stake in Orgain, which has one of the top-selling plant-based protein ready-to-drink shakes in the US. Nestlé also owns nutritional drinks brand Boost.
Nestlé is not the only foodmaker expanding in this area. In March, Danone purchased UK-based Huel, a maker of fortified protein powders and drinks backed by celebrities like actor Idris Elba, boosting its range of protein-packed dairy products.
Nestle recently combined its health science and nutrition divisions to create a larger platform focused on specific needs such as longevity, infant formula and products that support gut health and obesity management for patients on GLP-1 weight-loss medications.
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Navratil said embedding nutrition into one of the company’s four core units was not driven by the need to cut costs but rather the opportunity to “unlock growth”. Speaking at a consumer conference in Paris on Tuesday, Navratil said there was a lot of overlap in areas such as protein, fibre and creatine, a quick source of energy for muscles, and combining nutrition with health science could help more effectively scale innovations globally.
The deal will be complete by July 3, with Nestlé executive Jolanda Schwirtz taking charge of yfood.
Source: https://www.theedgesingapore.com/amp/news/fb-sector/nestl-buys-out-yfood-founders-first-acquisition-new-ceo