It became known that the Karat company, best known for Druzhba and Yantar processed cheeses, may well be absorbed by the French group Bel. It is reported that takeover talks have already begun.
The reason for the sale, according to the RBC daily publishing house, is the large debts of Karat, whose financial problems began back in 2007. At the same time, the amount of the transaction could be 500 million rubles.
Also, according to some unnamed sources, Karat is in talks with some other (also unnamed) companies.
However, some time after the publication appeared in RBC daily, the owner of Karat, Vladimir Korsun, issued a statement in which he denied this information. However, taking into account the fact that at the end of 2009 his company's debt amounted to about 2.5 billion rubles, this option still remains very likely.
