Sapporo Breweries, renamed from Sapporo Holdings on July 1, 2026, reported first-half net profit attributable to owners of ¥295.4bn, up ¥293.7bn from ¥1.8bn a year earlier. Nearly all of that increase came from a single accounting event: the loss of control over its wholly owned property subsidiary, referred to in the filing by the abbreviation SRE, after SPARK GK, an investment vehicle backed by PAG Investment Management and Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, completed the first of three planned share purchases on June 1, 2026.
SPARK acquired 51.0% of SRE's voting rights in that first closing; a second closing set for June 2028 will add another 29.0%, and a third in June 2029 will transfer Sapporo's remaining stake, ending its ownership of the property business entirely. Before the sale, Sapporo kept a 30% trust interest in the Ebisu Garden Place complex, plus the Ginza Place building and part of Sapporo Garden Park, rather than passing them to SPARK. The deconsolidation produced a ¥315.0bn accounting gain; ¥154.4bn of that came from remeasuring Sapporo's retained stake in the former subsidiary at fair value, with the balance reflecting the rest of the control-loss calculation.
Strip out that one-off and the picture is less flattering. Revenue from continuing operations, which cover the group's domestic and overseas alcohol, food, beverage, and restaurant businesses, rose just 0.3% to ¥235.9bn, while operating profit flipped to a ¥5.9bn loss from a ¥5.2bn profit a year earlier. The company booked ¥9.9bn in impairment charges, including ¥6.8bn tied to a production overhaul at its US business and ¥3.0bn linked to transferring its vending-machine unit, on top of ¥5.6bn in US restructuring costs.
| Metric | H1 2025 | H1 2026 |
|---|---|---|
| Revenue (continuing operations) | ¥235.3bn | ¥235.9bn |
| Operating profit/loss | ¥5.2bn profit | ¥5.9bn loss |
| Net profit attributable to owners | ¥1.8bn | ¥295.4bn |
| Total assets (period-end) | ¥632.2bn | ¥870.5bn |
| Equity attributable to owners (period-end) | ¥193.0bn | ¥512.9bn |
The filing bundles in several other changes. Shareholders approved the company's name change from Sapporo Holdings to Sapporo Breweries Limited at the March 27 annual meeting, effective July 1, 2026; on the same date, the company absorbed its wholly owned operating subsidiary of the same name as the surviving entity. Separately, Pokka Sapporo Food & Beverage is spinning off its vending-machine business to a new company set up by Life Drink Company, effective October 1, 2026. The board also declared an interim dividend of ¥20 per share, ¥7.8bn in total, payable September 14 to shareholders on record as of June 30.
As a subsequent event disclosed in the same filing, Sapporo agreed on July 6 to pay roughly $643mn (about ¥102.9bn) for a 25% stake in a new Singapore joint venture with Carlsberg A/S, combining beer operations across Southeast Asia and Hong Kong and targeted to launch in December 2026 pending regulatory approval. The company said the impact on this year's consolidated results would be minor.
The package also includes the standard management sign-off confirming the interim report's contents meet disclosure rules, with the company's representative director and president certifying that no special matters arose.