Summa Equity has taken a majority stake in Schulz & Berger Luft- und Verfahrenstechnik, a company specialised in air systems technology mainly used in the waste management and recycling industry.
Swedish impact investor Summa Equity has taken a majority stake in Schulz & Berger Luft- und Verfahrenstechnik (S&B), a German company specialising in air sorting and dedusting systems mainly used in waste management and recycling facilities. The company invested through the €2.3bn Summa Equity Fund III, a growth and buyout focused fund investing across the Nordics and Northern Europe.
S&B designs, manufactures, installs and services a range of air technology systems, including air classifiers which use air flow to separate heterogenous waste and recyclable materials based on their density and aerodynamic properties.
Speaking to Impact Investor, Bertrand Camus, the former CEO of French waste management and water treatment utility company Suez, who is now a partner for Summa Equity, said: “The air separators are used on the sorting line in municipal recycling facilities to separate plastic, paper, glass and other fractions, collected from households and businesses, according to their density.”
The company also manufactures dust extraction systems that can be used in most production and disposal processes across a variety of industries to minimise health risks for people, machine wear and tear, and environmental impacts.
“A lot of dust is created in the movement and processing of waste materials,” said Camus.
“For health and safety reasons and to prevent fire risk, the dust needs to be captured and the air treated. Schulz & Berger provide an end-to-end solution for the full recycling line,” he added.
Headquartered in the city of Altenburg, S&B also offers ventilation systems for industrial, commercial, and residential buildings.
“This is a third line of the company’s business, representing about a quarter of the turnover, but there are also several technical synergies between dust extraction and ventilation, which can be leveraged as the company grows. It also helps to reduce air pollution, which is one of the objectives of the fund’s thematic focus on circularity,” said Camus.
The Article 9 fund’s other themes include sustainable food, energy transition and tech-enabled resilience.
Complementary capabilities
Camus explained that last year, Summa Equity created Global Circular Solutions, a holding company focused on the circular economy to accommodate the buyout in September of Bollegraaf & Lubo Recycling Solutions, a Dutch company which designs and manufactures recycling and sorting systems covering all major waste streams and sorting applications for the European and North American markets. S&B will also be part of Global Circular Solutions, he said.
“Last year, we acquired Bollegraaf, which is a turnkey solutions provider for recycling and sorting facilities, including household waste sorting equipment such as the yellow bins in France. The Schulz & Berger investment was made through the same structure and will become a sister company of Bollegraaf, expanding our capabilities in this ecosystem,” said Camus, explaining that as a product-oriented company S&B wasn’t restricted to servicing Bollegraaf and could sell its products to competitors as well.
Summa Equity said the complementary capabilities of S&B and Bollegraaf strengthened its position in waste sorting and recycling innovation and that now that both companies were part of Global Circular Solutions, they would expand their geographic reach, enhance their product offerings, and accelerate growth across key markets.
“S&B complements the activities of Bollegraaf, they have a great reputation and there are a lot of industrial synergies between the two companies, both of whom manufacture their own equipment,” added Camus.
S&B employs 160 full-time staff across its sites and affiliated entities and has a strong presence in the DACH region. The company generated €30m in revenue in 2024.
