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Sindhu Bhattacharya

New Delhi , June 20

CARBONATED soft drinks (CSD) major PepsiCo plans to begin bottling `Gatorade' in India by August this year. The $2-billion sports drink brand Gatorade, which was introduced in India late last year, will be bottled at the company's plant at Aurangabad, Maharashtra.

The PepsiCo India President, Mr Rajeev Bakshi, told Business Line: "We had earlier wanted to begin manufacturing Gatorade from July but there has been a one-month delay. It will now begin from August in a small capacity at Aurangabad. This project will need Rs 10-12 crore investment."

Gatorade, which PepsiCo claims scientifically formulated to replace fluids and electrolytes and provide energy to enhance athletic performance, is sold as a sports drink in several variations across the world.

However, in India, the company has introduced only the ready-to-drink version in non-returnable bottles. At present, the drink is imported and sold through the existing distribution channel of PepsiCo's juice brand Tropicana.

Mr Bakshi said Gatorade will continue to be sold at select points such as gyms and health clubs besides the Tropicana distribution channel but there were no plans to mass-market this product at present.

Speaking on the CSD business, he said typically, the peak summer season sales are divided into two halves. The pre-monsoon period is from March to June-end and the post-monsoon from July to December.

"This year, sales growth in the pre-monsoon period has been average because of erratic weather. The season began late and is expected to end late too. But while sales growth till June-end has been average, I expect the post-monsoon period to see higher growth in turnover terms," he said.

Last year, both Coca-Cola and PepsiCo had hiked prices around August to shore up margins. This year, an erratic summer and higher product prices appear to have dampened growth of the entire category to some extent.

Mr Bakshi said the company's bottled water and fruit juice business was growing at over 30 per cent in volume terms this year. When asked whether the sales of the recently-launched Lipton Ice tea were encouraging, he said it was too early to comment.

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Pepsi to start bottling of Gatorade in India by Aug

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