Asahi Group Halts Production in Japan Following Cyberattack Disrupting Beer Manufacturing

Japan’s largest beer producer, Asahi Group, announced a suspension of order intake and shipments in the country after a cyberattack that paralyzed production processes at several plants.

According to the press service, as of Tuesday, some of the 30 domestic plants remained suspended as the company assesses the extent of the damage and plans further steps toward recovery.

Asahi Group, which owns the brands Asahi Super Dry Beer and Nikka Whisky, as well as a broad portfolio of non-alcoholic beverages, said it could not yet determine a timeline for the restoration of production.

The incident first came to light on Monday, when the company reported a suspension of order processing, shipments in its Japanese units, and the call center due to a “system-wide outage”.

At this time the company has not provided details about a possible perpetrator, but assured that the cyberattack did not lead to customer data leakage.

Timeline of events and impact on production

In the company’s statement it said: “We are actively investigating the cause and working to restore operations,” however it did not specify exact timelines for returning to normal operations.

We are actively investigating the cause and working to restore operations.

It was also noted that the situation did not cause customer data breaches and did not affect other regional supply chains, but local production lines suffered outages and required time to recover.

Asahi is the name that, in Japanese, means “morning sun.” The company was founded in 1889, and its history began with the release of the first Asahi Draft Beer in 1900. Today, Asahi is one of the world leaders in the beverage industry, with a portfolio of brands across markets, including Peroni, London Pride, and Grolsch, as well as several non-alcoholic labels.

The group did not disclose a possible attacker, but said that the cyberattack did not lead to a customer data breach.