Carlsberg and Heineken appear set to resume open warfare once they complete the carve-up of Scottish & Newcastle in the spring.

After a week of tough negotiations, the continental brewers yesterday sealed a recommended 800p-a-share takeover of S&N, valuing Britain’s biggest brewer at £7.8 billion — or more than £10 billion including debt and pension liabilities.

S&N shares rose 17p to 783p as the likelihood of a counterbid from rival brewers such as SABMiller and Anheuser-Busch, the owner of Budweiser, faded despite John Dunsmore, S&N’s chief executive, saying that all the necessary information on the company was “in the shop window”, which would allow other potential suitors to weigh up the merits of a bid.

From a funding and competition perspective the joint bidders made ideal partners, but Jorgen Buhl Rasmussen, the president and chief executive of the Danish brewer Carlsberg, appeared to end their uneasy truce as he outlined ambitious plans to overtake Heineken as Europe’s biggest brewer.

“I can predict we will become leaders in Europe ahead of our dear colleagues at Heineken,” Mr Rasmussen said. “Or dear rivals, I should say.”

Once the S&N spoils are divided, Heineken’s volumes in Europe will be about 94 million hectolitres, while Carlsberg will be No 2 in the market with about 86 million hectolitres.

However, Carlsberg is likely to struggle to close the gap on Heineken in the UK, where it is distant fourth in the brewing league. With brands such as Kronenbourg and John Smith’s, the British arm of S&N, which the Dutch group is acquiring, is by some distance the country’s biggest brewer and Carlsberg has for several years failed to make significant progress in what is a mature market.

Jean-François van Boxmeer, chairman and chief executive of Heineken, was equally bullish and said there was potential for growth in some West European markets. He said: “In many of those so-called mature markets you also find a lot of dynamism and opportunities for growth. Mature markets are not synonymous with decline.”

Mr van Boxmeer said that the £120 million of synergies identified by Heineken in its takeover of S&N’s operations in Britain, Ireland, Portugal, Finland and Belgium would involve redundancies. S&N’s group headquarters in Edinburgh, where about 150 people work, would “become redundant” and the UK head office, which employs a further 600 in Edinburgh, would be “integrated in our Western Europe division”. No decision had been taken on where Heineken’s enlarged UK operations would be based. “You cannot assume that the entire headquarters will be cut out,” Mr van Boxmeer said.

Analysts predicted that, initially, redundancies would be limited, given that Heineken had only a small business in the UK, although S&N hinted recently that its brewery in Berkshire was likely to close.

Mr van Boxmeer said that he did not intend to scrap any of S&N’s beer and cider brands in the UK, but he admitted that the growth strategy would be based on investing in the biggest brands while using S&N’s distribution channels as a platform on which to increase sales of Heineken.

Carlsberg is acquiring Brasseries Kronenbourg, S&N’s French business, in the carve-up, but Heineken has agreed a 50-year licence to retain control of the Kronenbourg 1664 brand in Britain. Carlsberg focussed on the opportunity created by assuming full control of Baltic Beverages Holding, its Russian joint venture with S&N.

The £10.3 billion enterprise value of S&N will be split 54.5 per cent in Carlsberg’s favour. It will acquire assets worth £5.8 billion with the remaining £4.5 billion of assets going to Heineken.

The 800p-per-share bid, a premium of 25.7 per cent to the price before the consortium declared their interest, has won irrevocable acceptance from the Hartwall family of Finland, which holds about 10 per cent of S&N shares.

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