<div id="readability-page-1"><div>Jan 1 (Reuters) - India's KFC and Pizza Hut operators Sapphire Foods and Devyani International said on Thursday they will merge in a $934 million deal, creating a fast-food franchisee powerhouse in the world's most populous country. The deal comes as India's fast-food franchisees grapple with higher costs, slowing same-store sales and margin pressure, while facing stiff competition from McDonald's and Domino's Pizza operators in a market where consumers are cutting back on non-essential spending. Devyani will issue 177 shares for every 100 shares of Sapphire as part of the deal and it expects annual synergies of 2.1 billion to 2.25 billion rupees ($23.34 million to $25.01 million) from the second full year of operations of the combined entity. The companies, partners of Yum Brands, run more than 3,000 outlets across India and overseas, including KFC and Pizza Hut dine-in restaurants and compete with the Indian operators of McDonald's and Domino's Pizza chains - Westlife Foodworld and Jubilant Foodworks. Both the KFC and Pizza Hut franchisees in India operate at a net loss, making scalability a challenge, said Akshay D'Souza, an independent consumer goods consultant. &#34;With the single entity, if they are able to unlock even half of the expected synergies, we will be seeing a profitable enterprise... where they can control costs better.&#34; In the quarter ended September, Sapphire's consolidated total costs rose 10% on-year to 7.68 billion rupees, while Devyani's spends rose 14.4% to 14.08 billion rupees. Devyani reported a net loss of 219 million rupees for the quarter ended September 30, reversing a profit of 170,000 rupees a year earlier, while Sapphire posted a wider consolidated net loss of 127.7 million rupees, compared with a loss of 30.4 million rupees a year ago. ($1 = 89.9625 Indian rupees) (Reporting by Hritam Mukherjee, Nishit Navin and Nandan Mandayam, writing by Chandini Monnappa; Editing by Howard Goller and Ros Russell)By Hritam Mukherjee and Nishit Navin</div></div>

百勝餐飲

印度的肯德基和必勝客運營商 Sapphire Foods 和 Devyani International 將以 9.34 億美元的交易合併，形成一個重要的快餐特許經營企業。此次合併旨在應對成本上升和來自麥當勞和多米諾的競爭等挑戰。Devyani 將向 Sapphire 的股東發行股票，並預計每年可實現約 2334 萬至 2501 萬美元的協同效應。兩家公司目前均處於淨虧損狀態，但合併可能通過更好的成本控制改善盈利能力

印度的肯德基和必勝客運營商將以 9.34 億美元的交易金額進行合併