Ukraine Conflict: Dutch Brewing Giant Heineken To No Longer Have Presence In Russia

Dutch brewing giant Heineken stated on Monday that its business in Russia “is no longer sustainable nor viable in the current environment and they have decided to leave Russia owing to the Ukraine conflict. However Heineken will continue to pay its 1,800 employees in Russia through the end of the year. The company says it will not profit from the sale of its Russian operations and expects to take a 400 million-euro (USD438 million) charge as a result.

In a statement released to the media, Heineken said,” We are shocked and deeply saddened to watch the war in Ukraine continue to unfold and intensify. We earlier announced that HEINEKEN stopped new investments and exports to Russia, ended the production, sale and advertising of the Heineken® brand, and announced that we will not accept any net financial benefits or profit from our business in Russia.

Following the previously announced strategic review of our operations, we have concluded that HEINEKEN’s ownership of the business in Russia is no longer sustainable nor viable in the current environment. As a result, we have decided to leave Russia.

We aim for an orderly transfer of our business to a new owner in full compliance with international and local laws. To ensure the ongoing safety and wellbeing of our employees and to minimise the risk of nationalisation, we concluded that it is essential that we continue with the recently reduced operations during this transition period. 

- In all circumstances, we guarantee the salaries of our 1,800 employees will be paid to the end of 2022 and will do our utmost to safeguard their future employment.

- We will not profit from any transfer of ownership and we expect an impairment and other non-cash exceptional charges of approximately €0.4 billion in total.

- Upon completion of the transfer HEINEKEN will no longer have a presence in Russia. The company further said that it continues to “hope that a path to a peaceful outcome emerges in the near term.”

An announcement from our CEO.
Read more: https://t.co/xxQUAlMW2Q pic.twitter.com/KmLyq7rjvd

— The HEINEKEN Company (@HEINEKENCorp) March 9, 2022

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