Tasmania’s Lark Distilling Co. to Acquire Pontville Distillery and Estate

HOBART, Australia, Oct. 18, 2021 /PRNewswire/ — Lark Distilling Co. Limited (ASX: LRK) (‘Lark‘ or ‘the Company‘), Australia’s leading distiller of single malt whisky, is pleased to announce that it has entered into a binding agreement for the acquisition of Kernke Family Shene Estate Pty Ltd, the owner of the Pontville Distillery and Estate (‘the Acquisition’), the construction of a new 1 million litre distillery on the acquired land and the acceleration of Lark’s export strategy.

The total consideration for the Acquisition is $40 million comprised of $38.5 million in cash and $1.5 million in Lark shares^[1] to be issued to the vendors. In order to fund the Acquisition, Lark is undertaking an equity raising of approximately $53 million comprised of a fully underwritten unconditional placement of $46.5 million (‘Institutional Placement‘) and a non-underwritten conditional placement of $6.4m (‘Conditional Placement‘, together the ‘Placement‘). A total of 10.6 million new fully paid shares are expected to be issued, representing approximately 16.8% of issued capital.

Directors of the Company are highly supportive of the Acquisition and intend to subscribe for $6.4m worth of shares via the Conditional Placement, subject to shareholder approval being obtained at Lark’s annual general meeting.

The iconic estate and distillery are located 30 minutes north of Hobart at Pontville and includes 40 acres of land and buildings, a 130,000 litre distillery, a cellar door, eight bond stores, a working cooperage and the historic stables and homestead.

Pontville will be Lark’s third working distillery in Tasmania, alongside its Cambridge and Bothwell sites and will contribute to the inhouse production of 576,000 litres of Lark whisky each year. Lark at Pontville will commence distilling from February 2022 with its cellar door open to the public from this date. All whisky distilling, product innovation and development will continue to be led by Lark’s Master Distiller Chris Thomson and his team. 

In addition, Lark has commenced planning for the construction of a new 1 million litre greenfield distillery on the Pontville site, expected to be commissioned in 2023.