PepsiCo was formed in 1965 by merging Pepsi-Cola and Frito-Lay.
The merger joined a soft-drink company with a snack-food producer, creating a broader food-and-beverage business. Pepsi-Cola traced its roots to Caleb Bradham's North Carolina pharmacy, while Frito-Lay had grown from snack brands including Fritos and Lay's potato chips.
PepsiCo's creation helped distinguish its corporate structure from Coca-Cola's, whose core identity remained strongly associated with beverages. The PepsiCo portfolio later expanded into additional drinks, snacks, and food brands, making the company much larger than the Pepsi beverage brand alone.
A frequent mistake is to treat Pepsi and PepsiCo as interchangeable names. Pepsi is a beverage brand; PepsiCo is the corporation that owns and manages a wide range of food and drink businesses. The merger date refers to the parent company, not the invention of Pepsi.