LONDON—Irish dairy products group Glanbia GL9.DB +0.27% PLC said on Friday it agreed to buy the Isopure Company LLC, a U.S. maker of protein shakes, in a $153 million deal that beefs up its fast-growing sports nutrition arm.
The acquisition is the latest in a string of deals that have allowed Glanbia to use the whey protein produced as a by-product in its cheese-making business as an ingredient in an expanding consumer products market.
Sales at the company's sports nutrition business account for around a fifth of revenue, rising 17% to €374.6 million ($484.1 million) in the first half of 2014. Sales across the group rose just 8.1%.
Isopure, which is based in New York and recorded sales of $74.6 million in its 2014 financial year, was an attractive acquisition target because its customer base is more diverse than Glanbia's own, said Patrick Higgins, an analyst at Dublin-based stockbroker Goodbody.
"It's more of a healthy lifestyle product so it's helping them branch out of the sports nutrition niche into a broader nutrition market," Mr. Higgins said. Although most of Isopure's customers are male, and its products are aimed at the bodybuilders who buy most of Glanbia's existing product range, sales are more tilted toward women than the sports nutrition market as a whole, he said.
The value of the global sports nutrition market will grow to $37.7 billion in 2019 from $20.7 billion in 2012, according to projections published by Transparency Market Research in February.
Glanbia began selling protein shakes straight to consumers through the $315 million acquisition of Optimum Nutrition Inc. in 2008, having previously sold its ingredients to drinks-makers. Its purchase of Optimum Nutrition was followed by that of another U.S. company, Bio-Engineered Supplements and Nutrition, bought for $144 million in 2011
