PepsiCo “Mega Plant” to Open in Saudi Arabia This Year

Pepsi bottler and distributor Saudi Industrial Beverages Co. (SIBCO) will open “one of the largest” manufacturing plants in the “PepsiCo ecosystem globally” in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia this year, a SIBCO senior official told news website Gulf Business in a recent interview.

The plant will manufacture a range of PepsiCo products, like Mountain Dew, Pepsi, and local brand Mirinda, serving customers in Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries – Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates (UAE), Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, and Bahrain, PepsiCo chief executive officer of Asia, Middle East, and North Africa (AMENA) Sanjeev Chadha told the publication.

The 85,000 sq ft “mega plant” will be located on a 138,158 sq ft site in Jeddah, also housing raw material storage, a warehouse, can storage building, central utility building, shipping building, waste water treatment plant and other facilities, according to information on the website of the project’s builder, Arabian Construction Co.

PepsiCo is eying the possibility exporting products made at the facility beyond the GCC region.

“While beverages are heavy, we are starting to transport them as well. They won’t ship very, very long distances, but as we are getting on to higher value added products, such as Gatorade – there will be greater possibilities and opportunities looking at export,” said Chadha in Gulf Business’ report. “And we are also looking at how do we create infrastructure [required for exports].”

Chadha also told the news organization that a PepsiCo plant will officially open on February 27 in Dubai operated by the Dubai Refreshments Company (DRC).

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