rs they choose (TheEconomist, 67). Coca-Cola is bottled at 13 sites across China; five of theseare state-owned. Also, Coca-Cola owns 2 concentrate plants in China. By 1996,Coca-Cola and its joint venture partners will have invested nearly $500million in China. Pepsi is planning a $350 million expansion plan that willadd 10 new plants. Both companies are ploughing profits straight back intoexpansion. They reason that any returns will not come until the next century.Coke and Pepsi in Sandia Arabia: In Saudi Arabia, Pepsi is the market leaderand has been for nearly a generation. Part of this is due to the absence ofits arch-rival, Coca-Cola. For nearly 25 years, Coke has been exiled from thedesert kingdom. Coca-Cola's presence in Israel meant that it was subject toan Arab boycott. Because of this, Pepsi has an 80% share of the $1 billionSaudi soft-drink market. Saudi Arabia is Pepsi's third largest foreignmarket, after Mexico and Canada (The Economist, 86). In 1993, almost 7% ofPepsi-Cola International's sales came from Saudi Arabia alone. Theenvironment in Saudi Arabia makes the country very conducive to soft-drinksales: alcohol is banned, the climate is hot and dry, the population isgrowing at 3.5% a year, and the Saudis' oil-based wealth "make it the mostvaluable market in the Middle East" (The Economist, 86). Coca-Cola, longknown as "red Pepsi", has finally started to fight back. The battle for SaudiArabia actually began 6 years ago, when the Arab boycott collapsed andCoca-Cola began to make inroads into the Gulf, Egypt, Lebanon, and Jordan.The start of the Gulf War, however, temporarily stunted Coca-Cola's growth inthe region. Pepsi's 5 Saudi factories worked 24 hours a day to keep thetroops refreshed. The most significant blow to Coca-Cola's return to thedesert, however, came at the end of the war, when General Norman Schwarzkopfwas shown signing the cease-fire with a can of diet Pepsi in his hand.Coca-Cola aims to control 35% of the...
