Asia (soft drink brand)
Asia is a brand of Chinese soft drink that are produced by Chinese civilian-run enterprise Xiangxue Pharmaceutical via a subsidiary Xiangxue–Asian Beverage. However, the brand was still owned by Guangzhou Municipal People's Government (via GLIG).
 | |
 A bottle of Asia Sarsae | |
| Product type | soft drink |
|---|---|
| Owner |
|
| Produced by | Xiangxue–Asian Beverage (Xiangxue Group) |
| Country | China |
| Introduced | 1946 |
| Markets | China |
| Asia | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Simplified Chinese | 亚洲 | ||||||
| |||||||
| Alternative Chinese name | |||||||
| Simplified Chinese | 亚洲汽水 | ||||||
| Literal meaning | Asia soft drink | ||||||
| |||||||
| Asia Sarsae | |||||||
| Simplified Chinese | 亚洲沙士 | ||||||
| Literal meaning | Asia sarsaparilla | ||||||
| |||||||
Asia's sarsaparilla was considered as a collective memory of the citizen of Guangzhou.[1]
History
The "Asia" brand soft drinks were started to produce in Guangzhou in 1946 and survived after the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949. However, the brand and the factory, were nationalized. Along with its sister brand "Pearl",[nb 1] they also exported to the nearby British colony Hong Kong since 1960s, in various kind of favour, such as Apple.[2]
It even formed a joint venture with PepsiCo after the marketization of China (As Pepsi-Asia Beverage Co. Ltd., incorporated in 1993). However, Pepsi abandoned the "Asia" brand and their products such as sarsaparilla, and the joint venture (now known as Chinese: 广州市亚洲饮料有限公司; lit.: 'Guangzhou Asia Beverage Co., Ltd.') was re-acquired by Guangzhou Municipal People's Government[3] (via Guangzhou Light Industrial And Trade Group (GLIG), Chinese: 广州轻工工贸集团有限公司). The rights to use the brand[nb 2] was also acquired by Xiangxue Pharmaceutical via another joint venture (Xiangxue owned 63.00% stake as of 2016;[4] GLIG was a minority shareholder[5]): Xiangxue Asian Beverage, which was incorporated in 2009. The new joint venture also rented the factory from the government which was owned by Guangzhou Asia Beverage.[4]:64
Footnotes
- Named after the Pearl River, also known as Pearl River Bridge (Chinese: 珠江橋牌)
- According to the trademark database (http://wsjs.saic.gov.cn), the brand was still owned by GLIG.
References
- 范文瑶 [Fan Wenyao] (15 June 2013). 喝一口沙士打个幸福的嗝. Southern Metropolis Daily (in Chinese). Guangzhou: Nanfang Media Group. Retrieved 2 November 2017 – via oeeee.com.
- 童年現在一般可愛 我要>o<汽水！【消失了，但忘不了！】. Eat and Travel Weekly (in Chinese). Hong Kong: Next Media. 6 April 2012. Retrieved 2 November 2017.
- 广州最老汽水厂能否重振雄风. 新快报 (in Chinese). Guangzhou. 26 June 2017. Retrieved 2 November 2017 – via china.com.
- 2016年年度报告 [2016 Annual Report] (PDF) (in Chinese). Xiangxue Pharmaceutical. 25 March 2017. Retrieved 2 November 2017 – via Shenzhen Stock Exchange.
- Filing in the National Enterprise Credit Information Publicity System
Further reading
- 杨, 志强. “亚洲”添翼正翱翔. 广州文史 (ebook) (in Chinese). 61. Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference Guangzhou Committee.