Coca-Cola To Introduce 'Thums Up' In ASEAN Countries

Beverages major Coca-Cola has intended to take its Indian soft drink brand Thums Up to neighbouring ASEAN countries including Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal, a top company official confirmed.

As part of its larger expansion plans, Coca-Cola has already introduced its cola variant Thums Up in Bangladesh last month.

Besides, Coca-Cola India also expects Thums Up, which was acquired by it from Parle Bisleri in 1993, to become a USD 1 billion brand by the end of this year or probably by next year.

"We have launched Thums Up Charged already in Bangladesh. It is being scaled up across Bangladesh now. We have also launched Rim Zim already last month there,” Coca-Cola India and South West Asia President T Krishnakumar.

He further added, "Next we are planning to move to Nepal in the next couple of months with Thums up Charge. We are going to launch as big as in Bangladesh. Once we see success, we would take it to other markets."

On being asked about any specific markets Coca-Cola is looking is eyeing for the brand Thums Up, he said: "We believe that we can do the entire south Asian markets."

"We can go places like Sri Lanka also. Then we can talk to our global HQ and go to some of ASEAN countries. Even at a later date, we can look at possibly Pakistan also. We could have more and more markets in Asia," he added.

Coca-Cola would export the brand in those markets and would get it locally manufactured.

"We would give brand name and all the ingredients and most of the time it would be manufactured locally and but would carry the Thums Up brand," Krishnakumar said.

Last year, Coca-Cola said that it expects Thums Up to be a USD 1 billion (about Rs 6,500 crore) brand in the next two years.

"I think we are well on the way. By the end of this year, we would be close to it and in the worst case scenario, it would be 2019 we should get to $1 billion(brand)," he added.

He further said that another Indian brand Maza would be the next candidate from the stable of Coca-Cola India to join the USD 1 billion club but would take some more time.

Besides, Thums Up, Coca-Cola India is looking over the possibility to take three other Indian brands to global markets - Limca, Maza, and Rim Zim.

"These are four brands in our stable which have potential to (go to) other markets and we are obviously creating more and more products as Aquarius Gluco Charge, which has creations in India... It can also go out to other similar markets," he added.