The owner of Burger King isn’t a frequent restaurant investor, but when it does make an investment, it goes big—and has a major impact on the restaurant market in the process. When it bought Burger King, as 3G Capital, for example, the company slashed costs, refranchised the system, focused on international growth and worked to generate profitable sales domestically—in the process giving Wall Street investors a blueprint they’re trying to push on many other companies. Today, RBI is one of the few companies that can and will take on any potential target, regardless of price. And with the stock symbol QSR, it’s a company that clearly has specific sites set for its future purchases.
2010: Brazilian PE firm 3G Capital purchases Burger King
2014: 3G, with Burger King, buys Tim Hortons for $11 billion to form RBI
2017: RBI pays a multiple of more than 20 times EBITDA to buy Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen