Keurig Green Mountain has been sold to JAB Holding for $13.9 billion:
The deal will make JAB the biggest player in the North American single-serve coffee pod market. "Keurig Green Mountain represents a major step forward in the creation of our global coffee platform," said JAB chairman Bart Becht, in a statement.
JAB has invested heavily in the US coffee market. It bought Caribou Coffee Co and Peet's Coffee & Tea in 2012 and formed a joint venture between coffeemakers DE Master Blenders and Mondelez International in July.
Keurig will continue to operate as an independent company after the purchase. Coca-Cola - Keurig's biggest investors- voiced its support for the deal in a statement. Coca-Cola will take a 17.4% stake in the new private company.
[...] Despite the higher cost of a single-serve coffee pod compared to a cup of filter coffee, the popularity of the machines continues to grow globally. According to Euromonitor International over the next three to five years, sales of single serve coffee pods are expected to grow by 5% in the US, 10% in Canada and 8% in Mexico. The research firm said the coffee pod business already accounts for 40% of the $15bn global coffee market.
Related: DRM: Coming to a Coffee Maker Near You
Keurig DRM Cracked By Competitors
Keurig Cup DRM Cracked
How much coffee do you drink each day?
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r00t writes:
"Taking a page out of Lexmark playbook, the Keurig company, famous for it's one-cup coffee making system, now comes with new and improved 100% DRM. Apparently, Keurig is upset over re-usable third-party 'coffee pods' which allow the consumer to escape the Keurig throw-away models which carry a retail price 5% to 25% more. Keurig's CEO, Brian Kelly referred to the move as 'game-changing performance.' Perhaps this will finally be the year of Linux on the Coffe Maker?"
Mike Masnick over at techdirt has an informative editorial up about Keurig's coffee maker DRM being cracked by its competitors.
... it appears that Keurig competitors have already figured out ways to crack the DRM. TreeHouse Foods very quickly announced that it would be able to break the DRM. Meanwhile, Mother Parkers' RealCup has just announced that its pods are compatible with Keurig's DRM. It's a little unclear from the press release if Mothers Parkers cracked the DRM or came to a deal with Green Mountain, though it sure sounds like it was internal work ...
Being both coffee and tech related, it had to be submitted.
Well, that didn't take long!
Last year, after Coke took 10% stake in the company, Keurig started shipping a new version of their instant coffee machines. The primary 'improvement' was the addition of DRM designed to exclude any coffee not approved by Keurig. It is a scheme very much like the ink cartridge DRM of IBM/Lexmark.
One coffee maker has decided to crack that Keurig's DRM and are now shipping a device you insert into the maker that lets you spoof it into thinking any coffee is 'authorized.' They are capitalizing on their new Freedom Clip by giving it away along with free samples of their coffee.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 08 2015, @10:09AM
Coffee is an Obedience Drug. Obedience drugs are legal. The law is, at its very core, a conspiracy of the powerful to make others Obey. Disobedience drugs are illegal.
(Score: 5, Informative) by takyon on Tuesday December 08 2015, @10:19AM
http://www.historyextra.com/article/food/brief-history-how-we-fell-love-caffeine-and-chocolate [historyextra.com]
If there's a problem, it's with the economic system that encourages people to consume stimulants (including caffeine, cocaine, whatever) in order to work longer and harder.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 08 2015, @10:24AM
Okay historical pedant. Disprove this claim: Sex Is Legal.
Come on, dig up some sodomy laws.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Tuesday December 08 2015, @06:09PM
Grinding for sweet loot until 4am is so much better with caffeine : ) Do you view cars as just a faster way to get to work?
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 2) by dltaylor on Tuesday December 08 2015, @10:48AM
Years ago, I wanted to buy one, but the one I wanted is not sold retail, only to businesses with high cup volume. I have a Reverse Osmosis unit, because our water is low in "livestock", but quite hard, and have a line to feed the ones that do not have the manual tank fill. Wasting water, or mixing fresher water with stale, is not my idea of how to do that. Since I couldn't, I stopped drinking coffee and just drink tea, some black, some herbal.
Lately, Peet's tea selection has been ruined for me, as well.They changed tea vendors and the two I bought regularly, the Black Currant, for iced tea, and their blend of Earl Grey, which was my SO's favorite, are gone or changed to something less desirable.
Lost sales from both lines.
(Score: 4, Funny) by LoRdTAW on Tuesday December 08 2015, @01:58PM
Lucky! I get the occasional goat or sheep in the pipe every now and then. And god help you if a cow or horse comes through!
(Score: 3, Insightful) by bzipitidoo on Tuesday December 08 2015, @01:01PM
Keurig's DRM makes them less valuable, but possibly the buyer has a bad case of religious belief in monopolies, and thought that made them more valuable.
I really must salute Keurig for raising awareness of how bad DRM is, unintentional on their part though that was.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 08 2015, @02:11PM
It is amazing that the buy-out price was low 90s when the stock had been trading in the low 50s. Something hinky going on there. Is it a coincidence that buyout price is about a 2% premium over what Coke paid for its shares?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 08 2015, @03:41PM
I'ved used Keurig at my last couple jobs at the office, and they work fine for me. Not as good as fresh ground, but much better than powdered instant, and more convenient too.
At around $140, it's priced for Xmas.
(Score: 1) by WillR on Tuesday December 08 2015, @04:02PM
The coffee always tastes burned and over-extracted, even when I turn the water temperature down as low as it will go.
The pods produce a lot of waste compared to fresh ground.
For around $140, you could get a cheap burr grinder, an electric kettle, and a small french press, and make MUCH better single-serving coffee.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 08 2015, @04:30PM
> For around $140, you could get a cheap burr grinder, an electric kettle, and a small french press, and make MUCH better single-serving coffee.
You left out the biggest cost of all - more time. A lot more time.
(Score: 3, Informative) by LoRdTAW on Tuesday December 08 2015, @05:22PM
Waiting for a little water to boil. Oh the humanity. Put the kettle on, grind beans, have a quick breather, pour boiling water into press and serve. Takes 3-5 minutes depending on how fast your kettle boils or warms. And only fill it with enough water for your serving.
People need to slow the fuck down and stop demanding instant everything. Instant food that is usually bad for you which is packaged in plastic that ends up in a landfill. Plus the go-go-go grind of daily life is shaving off a decade or two or more from our lives due to stress.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 08 2015, @07:21PM
In general I agree with you, but in this case cleaning the French press gets to be a pain when all you want to do is get a quick cup of coffee.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 08 2015, @11:30PM
> People need to slow the fuck down and stop demanding instant everything.
Get off my lawn! When I was a kid I used to walk up hill in the snow both ways!
Shake your fist all you want, it is not a persuasive argument to people who aren't already persuaded. If that shit worked we'd all be running 100% Free software, Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg would both be paupers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 09 2015, @01:57AM
People need to slow down and drink some coffee?
(Score: 2) by everdred on Tuesday December 08 2015, @05:03PM
coffee++
(Score: 3, Informative) by mendax on Tuesday December 08 2015, @09:32PM
Keurig coffee-making machines are just the latest attempt at making the impossible: a good cup of coffee. This is impossible, of course, because coffee is nasty, nasty, nasty. However, billions of dollars are spent on marketing this swill to people. Drink tea. It's much cheaper, better for you, and better for the environment.
It's really quite a simple choice: Life, Death, or Los Angeles.