In an attempt to provide millions with safe drinking water, Unilever is busy with its biggest acquisition in China for more than a decade.

The global corporation is doubling the size of its water purification business in an effort to bring safe drinking water to 500 million people by 2020. Unilever has been building a global water purification business with Pureit. Pureit’s affordable water purification device is already present in countries in Africa, South Asia, South-east Asia, and Latin America. Unilever is now paying an undisclosed sum for a majority stake in China’s Quinyan Group.

Quinyan employs 2 500 staff members and generated approximately R 2 billion in sales in the last year. China’s water purification market has been growing at the rate of 20% a year for the past three years

Unilever chief executive Paul Polman told Express, “This deal will more than double the size of our water purification business and will bring together complementary technology from Pureit and Qinyuan and leverage Qinyuan’s local marketing insight, manufacturing and distribution strength – all under the Unilever umbrella.”