Credit: REUTERS/Brendan McDermidAdds background on Jana
Sept 22 (Reuters) - Activist investor Jana Partners has a nearly 10% stake in pet food maker Freshpet Inc FRPT.O, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday, citing people familiar with the matter.
The investor plans to push Freshpet to take steps to boost its stock price, including exploring a sale, the report said. (https://on.wsj.com/3f1ft2Y)
The companies did not immediately respond to Reuters request for comment.
Jana Partners has a history of pushing for change in the food and beverage industry. It had previously urged for changes at Whole Foods that was later sold to Amazon AMZN.O, and at Pinnacle Foods, which Conagra Brands CAG.N acquired in a nearly $11 billion deal in 2018.
The investor has also been pushing for changes at packaged food maker TreeHouse Foods Inc THS.N since last year. In April, TreeHouse said it had appointed Scott Ostfeld, a partner at Jana, to its board as part of an agreement with the New York-based company.
Shares of Freshpet gained 17% in afternoon trade. The company has lost nearly three-fifths of its market capitalization so far this year, as markets slipped due to rate hikes and inflation.
(Reporting by Niket Nishant and Ananya Mariam Rajesh in Bengaluru; Editing by Shinjini Ganguli)
((Niket.Nishant@thomsonreuters.com;))
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