Nestle Buys Pfizer's Baby Food Unit for Nearly $12 Billion

 EUROPE BUSINESS NEWSUpdated April 23, 2012  ZURICH—Global food company Nestle SA NESN.VX -2.89%sealed its biggest deal in more than a decade Monday when it agreed to acquire Pfizer Inc.'s infant nutrition business for $11.85 billion in a move that allows the Swiss firm to take a big leap in market share in the rapidly growing Asian baby food market.  The Swiss food giant beat rival Groupe Danone SA for the Pfizer unit after a months-long auction. For Nestle, the purchase is a way to build its presence in China, one of the largest markets for baby milk products. For Pfizer it marks an important step in its ambition to focus on its core business of developing and selling drugs. The U.S. drugmaker had said in July that it plans to divest the infant-nutrition business as well as an animal-health unit.  Nestle is the global leader in infant nutrition, but it has lacked scale in the rapidly growing Chinese market. The Vevey, Switzerland company, had a 22% share of the $39 billion world-wide market in 2010, ranking ahead of Mead Johnson Nutrition Co. and Danone, according to the most recent data from Euromonitor International, a market-research firm. But in China, it ranked just eighth with 3.7% share of the $8 billion baby food market. Combining its own with that of Pfizer means Nestle jumps to No. 2 in the market with a share of 10.4%, behind Mead Johnson with a 10.6% share and ahead of Danone with a 9.2% share.