After months of speculation, it was revealed yesterday that Thai Union Frozen Products Public Company Limited (TUF) has entered into a binding agreement to acquire 100% of the shares of North America’s largest seafood company, Bumble Bee Foods, LLC. Fishing industry news service, Undercurrent News broke the story on Thursday and has been reporting on it since June of this year.

Billed as the “game changer” for the US tuna sector, Thai Union, which formerly operated in American Samoa as Samoa Packing stands to take a frontline position in the American tuna sector with the acquisition of Bumble Bee, reducing the market down to two, since it already controls the Chicken of the Sea brand in the US.

When rumors of the acquisition first surfaced this year, industry analyst Youssef Abboud told Undercurrent News, that he estimated StarKist’s share of the US market at 36%, Bumble Bee’s at 25% and Chicken of the Sea’s at 20%.

“If Thai Union can deal with potential antitrust problems and acquires Bumble Bee, the US canned tuna industry could be shared largely between two key players, StarKist being the other,” wrote Abboud, in a report the fishing industry publication reported in July 2014.

According to Undercurrent, the total purchase price is $1.51 billion. The closing of the acquisition remains subject to clearance by the United States antitrust authorities and other closing conditions set forth in the acquisition agreement.

The two parties expect the transaction will close in the second half of 2015. A Pan-Atlantic private equity firm Lion Capital currently privately owns bumble Bee.

Undercurrent News quotes TUF president Thiraphong Chansiri saying, “The deal is the largest acquisition in the history of our company and one of the most exciting external growth propositions. Upon completion, the transaction will be immediately accretive to TUF’s earnings and cash flows and will increase TUF’s group revenues by approximately 25%.”

Undercurrent News also reported that Shue Wing Chan, CEO of Thai Union’s US-facing subsidiary Chicken of the Sea International, welcomed the move as it will enhance the group’s portfolio of seafood products in the US and Canada.

Thai Union plans to improve operating efficiencies raw material sourcing and production while also advancing product innovation through the purchase, according to statements made to Undercurrent.

Despite being fierce competitors for market share in the past, Thai Union and Bumble Bee already co-operate somewhat in the US market. Chicken of the Sea-branded cans are now produced in Bumble Bee’s Santa Fe Springs, California plant for sale on the west coast, with Bumble Bee packing for the east coast in Thai Union’s Lyons, Georgia-based plant that opened right after Thai Union closed down Samoa Packing and left the territory.

Bumble Bee signed a memorandum of understanding with the Samoa government in June of this year to set up cannery operations at Matautu Wharf in the town area of Apia, creating more than 1,000 jobs in that country.

Bumble Bee CEO Chris Lischewski said in August that the company is planning a processing plant for pre-cooked loins and frozen tuna products in Samoa and expects to break ground before the end of 2014, while operations are planned to begin in the fourth quarter of 2015.

As of this writing the groundbreaking has not taken place and Radio New Zealand reported earlier this month that government sources in Apia say a review of the Bumble Bee project by fisheries and environmental officials is in progress, though not at the pace the cannery would like.

When the plant is operational, pre-cooked tuna loins would be shipped from Samoa to the US for canning in Bumble Bee’s processing plant in Santa Fe Springs, California. Bumble Bee will also be processing frozen albacore, yellowfin and bigeye for the frozen fish market in North America.