Philippines food and beverage giant, San Miguel Corp (SMC) is planning to build 26 distribution centres across the Philippines with the intention of venturing into the logistics business.

According to a report by BusinessWorld, SMC is currently in the process of identifying possible key city sites for the proposed centres. The centres will then serve as the mother distribution centres of San Miguel's small sales offices nationwide.

A source also told BusinessWorld that the centres are aimed at developing the supply side by integrating the different sales destinations.

Investment for the future sales centres will not significant according to the report.

SMC is also expected to sign an agreement with RFM Corp, for the acquisition of bottling company, Cosmos Bottling Corp. Cosmos posted a 33% growth in net sales of 5.6 bn pesos (US$108m) for the nine month period to September 2001, compared to 4.2bn pesos for the same period last year.