San Miguel Beer

As part of its overseas expansion, San Miguel moved into the Spanish market in 1953, setting up the company which would later become San Miguel Spain. Since 1946, there has been a company engaged in the production of malt for medicinal purposes known as La Segarra. In the early 1950s, its key shareholders Enrique Suárez Rezona, Ramón Vidal and Jaime Muñiz made contact with Andrés Soriano, then president of San Miguel Brewery, to allow them to produce beer under the San Miguel name in Spain. In 1953, San Miguel Brewery, Inc. signed the “Manila Agreement”, with the Philippine brewer setting up a new Spanish brewery, La Segarra, S.A. The company would later be renamed San Miguel Fabricas de Cerveza y Malta, S.A. in 1957, an affiliate of San Miguel Brewery, Inc. which initially held 20% equity share via its Hong Kong subsidiary.[2]

The company was acquired by Mahou, S.A. from Groupe Danone in 2000, combining to form Spain’s largest brewer, the Mahou-San Miguel Group.[3] On 26 February 2014, San Miguel and Mahou-San Miguel signed a co-operation agreement to promote jointly San Miguel Beer and expand its global footprint.

The history of San Miguel traces back to 1890, when a group of Spaniards decided to open the first brewery in Southeast Asia, specifically in Manila. The factory produced diverse types of beers and derivative products under the name “San Miguel”. In the colonial capital no one knew beer until then. For this reason the inauguration of the brewery was a historic event and became known as “The day of San Miguel”.[4]

In February 1946 the corporation La Segarra S.A. was formed in Lleida, Catalonia, with the purpose of making beer, although the bureaucratic process caused production to be delayed until 1953. So, in 1954 the Group returned to Spain in a vessel stocked with Asian yeasts that made a 45-day journey across the ocean. In 1957 the Manila Agreement was signed with the president of San Miguel Brewery, Andrés Soriano Sr., and San Miguel, Beers and Malts Factory S.A. was established, independent from the Manila company. From that moment on, the two companies have followed different paths.

In 1965 San Miguel arrived in Africa, and by 1967 it spread to other capitals in Europe like London, Paris and Berlin. In 1970 it bought the Spanish- Dutch beer brand GULDER and its factory in Burgos. The three factories had a capacity of 600,000 hl, achieving a share of 7% of the national market. Thanks to the progressive opening in Spain and the work of the exports department, the 70s were a time of growth in exports of the beer both in Western and Eastern Europe and Northern Africa, reaching an annual figure of 125,000 hl.[5]

The formation of the Mahou-San Miguel Group traces its origin to Danone stocks. In 1994 the French multinational acquired 18% of San Miguel, Beers and Malts Factory. In 1997 Danone grew its share to 82% and also owned a large part of Mahou. In the following years, Danone lost interest in the company and therefore the beer maker took advantage of the synergy with Mahou, merging the two and becoming Mahou-San Miguel. Later on it also absorbed the beer maker Alhambra of Granada.[6]