October 12, 2023
Sustainable raw materials producer and climate technology company Perpetual Next has signed a definitive agreement this week with a participant of Perpetual Next to expand the biogas division through acquisitions, especially in the growth market of Poland. The collaboration aims to add EUR 25 million of annual EBITDA to Perpetual Next's biogas division over the next two years. As part of this broad acquisition program, several potential projects have now been proposed by this participant. Today, a first agreement was concluded for an acquisition in Poland.
This concerns the collaboration with the new Momentum Capital partners Jan Harthoorn and Jan van Middendorp who have made their business network available to provide Perpetual Next with faster and better access to the growing Polish biogas market. In addition to being holder of Perpetual Next series A certificates, they are also one of the six family funds (see news release) that have recently become shareholders of Momentum Capital. Momentum Capital is indirectly the majority certificate holder of Perpetual Next.
Harthoorn and Van Middendorp
The background of Jan Harthoorn and his cousin Jan van Middendorp and their contribution to Perpetual Next:
Relationship with Momentum and sale of own company
"Since 2016 we have been involved as an investor in Momentum Capital and its participations and recently we have also become one of the new partners of Momentum Capital itself. We look with great interest at the developments of the group. We also see many similarities at the time of the sale of our own family business in cold storage and logistics in 2013 to the American private equity investor Oaktree Capital. In the following years, we remained a minority shareholder and became co-responsible for the Buy & Build strategy in Europe. Within 3 years we became the 3rd player in Europe and 4th in the world and in 2020 the group was sold for US Dollar 1.74 billion to the largest player in the world of freezer storage: Americold."
Experience in Poland
"One of the companies we bought at the time had its cold store in Gdansk and that's how we became familiar with the Polish market and culture. When Martijn van Rheenen, founder of Momentum Capital, told us about the development of the biogas market in Poland, we immediately offered ourselves to help with that. We are familiar with building the right product/market combination with all associated facets. In particular, we have knowledge of the network, such as the processing industry in the field of agri and food, contacts with big names such as Animex and Cedrob and contacts with government institutions. In addition, we know the major players from the freezing industry, who are large energy consumers and are interested in biogas." 2
Collaboration with Perpetual Next
"We work in a compact team with diverse competencies and managerial and organizational experience in multiple disciplines: from business development to full integration. We also have extensive experience in the purchase and sale of large volumes of agricultural raw materials. In particular, we expect to be able to do a lot for building up raw material contracts for Perpetual Next, focused on organic waste and agri-residues. We work closely with Rene Buwalda and his team."
from left to right: Jan van Middendorp, Rene Buwalda and Jan Harthoorn sign agreement for acquisitions in the Polish biogas market.
First projects in Poland
The Polish market is promising for the biogas sector, in particular due to the improving economy and the eventual closure of landfills. Perpetual Next has its own team in Poland for the development of new projects and acquisitions. With the cooperation with the group of Jan Harthoorn and Jan van Middendorp, there will be an additional strengthening and acceleration in the entry of the Polish market. This allows the Perpetual Next team to focus more on the technical aspects of the projects.