United Kingdom: British largest regional brewer Wolverhampton & Dudley announced on December 3 it is acquiring small rival Burtonwood brewery for 119 million GBP after meeting forecasts with a 6.3 % rise in annual profit. "Burtonwood has an excellent estate of 460 pubs which are a good geographic fit with our existing 1,675 pubs," W&DB Chief Executive Ralph Findlay said on Friday, December 3. "There are significant opportunities to develop further the Burtonwood estate under the ownership of W&DB," he added. Ralph Findlay said he expected the Burtonwood deal to be concluded by early January. Refurbishment would follow and food menus would be expanded, he added.

Wolves & Dudley said it would be able to make 3 million pounds a year in cost savings from the combination and would supply the new pubs with its own beers, such as Marston's Pedigree. W&DB posted underlying pretax profit of 77.7 million pounds for the 53 weeks to October 2, compared with analyst forecasts between 76 million and 78 million pounds.

Over 400 of the Burtonwood pubs will be operated by W&DB's tenanted Union Pub Company, which generated a 4.2 percent increase in like-for-like sales in the first 8 weeks of this year. The rest will join its managed Pathfinder Pubs, which include the Pitcher & Piano chain and reported a 3.2 percent increase in like-for-like sales, according to Reuters.

W&DB increased its dividend by 10 percent to 35.32 pence per share. Its shares closed at 947 pence on Thursday, valuing the group at 758.5 million pounds.

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