Procuritas portfolio company DSI strengthens its position with two substantial add-on acquisitions

Procuritas Capital Investors VI (“Procuritas”) portfolio company DSI Freezing Solutions A/S (“DSI”), the Denmark-based market leader in plate freezing technology, has acquired Cryogenic Equipment and Services NV (“CES”) and signed a contract to acquire Dantech Freezing Systems A/S (“Dantech”). These acquisitions transform DSI into a new global player with the industry’s widest product range within industrial freezing, cooling, and heat treatment of food.

DSI has expanded its portfolio with the acquisition of the Belgian company CES, an expert in cryogenic freezing, as well as Dantech, which is among the world leaders in mechanical freezing technology, especially spiral and tunnel freezers. As a result, DSI is now the only global supplier of all three types of freezing technology, creating significant synergies for both existing and future customers.

Despite the Covid-19 pandemic, DSI achieved a top-line growth of over 5% and a bottom-line growth of over 10% in 2020, growth is projected to continue and the new group expects a turnover of more than DKK 500 million in 2021.

Oskar Lindholm-Wu, Partner at Procuritas, commented: “We are delighted to announce these add-on acquisitions which are a great step forward in our transformational growth strategy for DSI, Procuritas’s first investment in its sixth fund.  DSI is a classic example of how we apply our decades of hands-on experience to build up a niche market leader through acquisitions as well as organic growth.”

Since DSI was acquired by Procuritas in 2017 the company has worked purposefully to build a strong platform for securing future growth. Partly through the acquisition of its long-standing partner Erlinord in 2017, which handles the automated part of the plate freezing process, and partly through massive investments in production, sales organisation, test facilities, R&D and IT. Today, DSI is present in Denmark, Korea, Singapore, Russia, and the United States.

“With these two new strategic acquisitions, DSI has become the only global player that can offer the food industry the full range of freezing technology as well as a broad choice of solutions for cooling and heat treatment of food,” says Lars Priess, CEO of DSI. “We look forward to getting even closer to our customers thanks to our strong production and service setup in Europe, the US and Asia. About half of our customers use several different types of freezing technology, which they can now get from a single supplier.”

Hans Vanackere, outgoing CEO of CES, added: “It was important for us to find a partner with a leading position, in-depth knowledge of the industry, focus on quality and customers, and a strong vision for the future development of the business.”

Henrik Ziegler and Carsten Bak Andreasen, co-founders of Dantech: “We were looking for a quality partner to boost and support our future growth, and to continue our focus on creating opportunities for the employees. We have found just that in DSI and Procuritas.”