Japan Tobacco Inc said on Monday it had agreed to buy the tobacco business of Akij Group, Bangladesh’s second-biggest tobacco company, for about 124.3 billion BDT ($1.48 billion) to further boost its presence in Asia.
Japan Tobacco said Akij holds a one-fifth share of Bangladesh’s cigarette market, the world’s eighth-largest in the world, and would add about 17 billion units to the Japanese company’s sales volume.