A NORTH Yorkshire ice-cream manufacturer has agreed to buy out its major French rival.

R&R Ice Cream of Northallerton, has acquired the 400 million-euro turnover Rolland – France’s third largest ice cream manufacturer – for an undisclosed sum.

The deal is set to increase sales for R & R to more than half a billion Euros and bring the number of its staff to 1,600.

The acquisition will create the second largest ice cream group in supermarket sales in the UK, Germany and France, selling 500 million litres of ice cream a year.

R&R Ice Cream was created in 2006 by Oaktree Capital Management merging Richmond Ice Cream with Roncadin. following its £180 million purchase of Richmond Foods plc.