Yum China Holdings has acquired a 5% equity interest in Fujian Sunner Development Co., Ltd.
Founded in 1983 and headquartered in the Fujian Province, Sunner has a vertically integrated business model covering the full production chain, which primarily includes chicken breeding and farming, feed processing and meat processing. According to the Poultry International Top Companies survey, it is the third largest poultry producer in China and the 15th largest in the world, having slaughtered 450 million broilers in the past year.
"We are excited to become a strategic investor in Sunner, our largest poultry supplier. Yum China and Sunner are longstanding business partners. The management team of Sunner has demonstrated exceptional execution capabilities over the years," Joey Wat, CEO of Yum China, said in a press release. "With this strategic investment, we look forward to enhancing Yum China's supply chain security and deepening our collaborations with Sunner, including in the areas of product development and innovations."
"Yum China has long been Sunner's largest customer and an integral part of our growth since the beginning. Sunner is delighted to welcome Yum China as our strategic investor," said Guangming Fu, founder and chairman of Sunner.
Yum China is the largest restaurant company in China in terms of 2020 system sales, with 10,506 restaurants in over 1,500 cities at the end of December 2020. As a licensee of Yum! Brands in Mainland China, Yum China has exclusive rights in mainland China for KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell.
It formed in 2016, after Yum! Brands announced the previous year that it would separate it’s Chinese operations into another entity, allowing the two independent, publicly traded companies to have distinct strategies and investment characteristics.
In addition to supplying products for Yum China, Fujian Sunner Development is a top supplier to McDonald’s, McKey, Fuk Hi and Dicos.
