PepsiCo North America Nutrition and The Hatchery Chicago Partner to Further Innovation in the Food Industry

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May 23, 2018, 10:01 ET

CHICAGO, May 23, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- PepsiCo North America Nutrition (NAN) and The Hatchery Chicago announced a partnership aimed at helping food industry entrepreneurs sustainably grow and scale their businesses. The partnership will foster collaboration with the long-term goal of making high-quality, delicious products available to more people in more places.

"I'm really excited about what we're doing to make sure trusted nutrition choices are always within reach," said Seth Kaufman, president of PepsiCo North America Nutrition. "One of the ways we do this is by collaborating with like-minded, nutrition-forward partners who provide great insight into the future of food and who can also benefit from our expertise and resources."

PepsiCo North America Nutrition was created to focus on PepsiCo's portfolio of trusted nutrition brands, including Quaker, Tropicana, Naked, Near East and KeVita, and underscore the company's Performance with Purpose agenda as it relates to continuing to transform its portfolio and help people eat better every day.

Food and beverage incubator, The Hatchery Chicago, has a similar mission of advancing the food industry. Its goal is to provide small businesses and entrepreneurs, many of which are focusing on the nutrition space, with the resources they need to best navigate and reach success in the food industry. The non-profit incubator's new location is being built in the heart of East Garfield Park on the west side of Chicago, an underserved community and food desert. The Hatchery believes that by fostering the growth of local food and beverage companies, the community will have more access to nutritional foods and viable and sustainable job opportunities within the industry.

The partnership will come to life in a variety of ways, including two-way mentorship between the organizations. Entrepreneurs will have the opportunity to receive insight from PepsiCo's leading experts, while PepsiCo employees will learn best practices from The Hatchery entrepreneur community on how to break down barriers to innovation and infuse start-up problem solving into their business.

"Our network of entrepreneurs will greatly benefit from NAN's deep knowledge and expertise around things like go-to-market strategies as a means to reach greater distribution," said Natalie Shmulik, chief executive officer of The Hatchery Chicago. "The future is all about collaboration, and we couldn't be happier to have PepsiCo join our group of exceptional partners and resources. This is where real change will happen."

The partnership is also part of NAN's efforts to spark innovation among employees by offering unique perspectives and exposure to new business models. Through shared learning opportunities with The Hatchery Chicago, PepsiCo will encourage employees to think differently about their business and act more nimbly in today's evolving food landscape.

About PepsiCo
PepsiCo products are enjoyed by consumers more than one billion times a day in more than 200 countries and territories around the world. PepsiCo generated more than $63 billion in net revenue in 2017, driven by a complementary food and beverage portfolio that includes Frito-Lay, Gatorade, Pepsi-Cola, Quaker and Tropicana. PepsiCo's product portfolio includes a wide range of enjoyable foods and beverages, including 22 brands that generate more than $1 billion each in estimated annual retail sales.

At the heart of PepsiCo is Performance with Purpose – our fundamental belief that the success of our company is inextricably linked to the sustainability of the world around us. We believe that continuously improving the products we sell, operating responsibly to protect our planet and empowering people around the world enable PepsiCo to run a successful global company that creates long-term value for society and our shareholders. For more information, visit www.pepsico.com.

About The Hatchery Chicago
The Hatchery is Chicago's premier, non-profit food and beverage incubator. Developed out of a collaboration between two reputable, non-profit organizations, Industrial Council of Nearwest Chicago and Accion, The Hatchery tackles three primary areas of need for entrepreneurs in the food and beverage industry—access to production space, financing, and resources. The Hatchery's new 67,000 sq. ft. state of the art facility will house 75-100 food and beverage manufacturers. This facility is expected to open in East Garfield park December 2018.

PepsiCo Cautionary Statement
Statements in this release that are "forward-looking statements" are based on currently available information, operating plans and projections about future events and trends. Forward-looking statements inherently involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those predicted in any such forward-looking statement. Such risks and uncertainties include, but are not limited to: changes in demand for PepsiCo's products, as a result of changes in consumer preferences or otherwise; changes in, or failure to comply with, applicable laws and regulations; imposition or proposed imposition of new or increased taxes aimed at PepsiCo's products; imposition of labeling or warning requirements on PepsiCo's products; changes in laws related to packaging and disposal of PepsiCo's products; PepsiCo's ability to compete effectively; political conditions, civil unrest or other developments and risks in the markets where PepsiCo's products are made, manufactured, distributed or sold; the ability to protect information systems against, or effectively respond to, a cybersecurity incident or other disruption; damage to PepsiCo's reputation or brand image; loss of any key customer or disruption to the retail landscape, including rapid growth in hard discounters and the e-Commerce channel; and other factors that may adversely affect the price of PepsiCo's publicly traded securities and financial performance.

For additional information on these and other factors that could cause PepsiCo's actual results to materially differ from those set forth herein, please see PepsiCo's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including its most recent annual report on Form 10-K and subsequent reports on Forms 10-Q and 8-K. Investors are cautioned not to place undue reliance on any such forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date they are made. PepsiCo undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

SOURCE PepsiCo