Published: August 25, 2026 at 1:53 pm
The acquisition of sports nutrition brand Huel by food giant Danone in a deal worth €1 billion has been cleared by UK competition regulators.
The deal was originally announced in March but last month the Competition and Markets Authority launched a merger inquiry which could have potentially scuppered it.
In the UK, the two businesses overlap in the supply of ready-to-drink meal replacement products to grocery retailers – Danone through its Alpro Meal-to-Go (M2G) meal replacement offering and Huel through its RTD ‘complete nutrition’ products.
The CMA found evidence that two businesses had monitored one another’s products and competed directly for customers.
However, it continued: “Taken together, the evidence indicates that whilst the merged entity will have a strong position in RTD meal replacement products and that the parties pose a degree of competitive constraint on each other, sufficient competitive alternatives will remain to constrain the merged entity.
“On this basis, the CMA has found that the merger would not give rise to a realistic prospect of a substantial lessening of competition… in the supply of RTD meal replacement products to grocery retailers in the UK.”