Hain Celestial has announced its intent to acquire U.K. soup company Yorkshire Provender Limited.
In a press release, Hain Celestial, which is the parent company of poultry company Hain Pure Protein and a shareholder in Empire Kosher Poultry, stated that an agreement has been reached between its wholly owned subsidiary, the Hain Daniels Group, and Yorkshire Provender. The potential transaction is subject to clearance from the Competition and Markets Authority in the United Kingdom.
Financial terms of the deal have not been released.
“We are excited to work together with the Yorkshire Provender team and leverage our combined infrastructures to drive future growth,” said Hain Daniels Group CEO James Skidmore. “This transaction expands the depth of our soup offering with Yorkshire Provender’s gluten-free, delicious premium recipes and flavors.”
Yorkshire Provender was founded in 2007. The company had about GBP6 million (US$7.45 million) in net sales during the 2016 calendar year.
The planned acquisition comes at a time when Hain Celestial is being investigated by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The company disclosed that its accounting practices are under review on February 10.
Hain Celestial has not released its quarterly financial results since May 2016, citing three months later that it was postponing the release of its financials as it identified concessions that were granted to certain distributors in the United States. In December 2016, Hain Celesial announced that an independent review with external counsel showed no intentional wrongdoing from the company related to its accounting practices.
Hain Celestial, headquartered in Lake Success, New York, has operations in North America, Europe and India.
