February 20, 2020 — Acquisitive Canadian seafood giant Cooke is eyeing a deal for Grupo Cabo Virgenes, an Argentina-based fishing and processing firm with a plant in Spain, reports Alimarket.
According to the website’s sources, Cooke is looking at buying all Cabo Virgenes’ assets, which include nine vessels and a plant in Argentina, and the value-added factory in Spain, but the talks are in the early stages and a deal is not imminent. Cooke is already operating in Spain, with seabass and seabream farmer Culmarex.
Cabo Virgenes and Cooke were not immediately available for comment to Undercurrent News.
An Undercurrent source confirmed he’d also heard of the talks. “Cooke needs to enter the Spanish [shrimp] market and Cabo Virgenes is a good operation for starting with wild shrimp in Argentina,” he said.
Cooke has already started to expand in the Argentinian shrimp sector and Glenn Cooke, co-founder and CEO, told Undercurrent last year the company plans more deals. Cooke was previously being linked to a deal for vessels owned by Grupo Conarpesa Continental Armadores de Pesca (Conarpesa), but nothing materialized. The company has also snapped up two Central American shrimp farmers, Seajoy Group and Farallon Aquaculture de Nicaragua.