Bad Mergentheim, 10 November 2023. BARTEC plans to divest the Food & BMS (FOOD) business unit in BARTEC Benke GmbH in Gotteszell to Ultrakust GmbH, a company of the Possehl Mittelstandsbeteiligungen (PMB), a Division of the Lübeck-based Possehl Group.
"As part of its strategic portfolio optimisation, BARTEC will focus on its core competencies in the field of explosion protection in the future, especially developing and implementing digital connectivity solutions. The sale of our FOOD business unit is therefore the consequent next step for BARTEC to further focus on our core business. We are pleased to have identified a partner in Ultrakust that will continue to provide our employees at the Gotteszell site with a safe and sustainable future," explains Dr. Thomas Rudolf Fritzmann, CFO BARTEC.
With the purchase of the FOOD business unit, the newly founded Ultrakust GmbH intends to further grow the business by utilizing the existing sales network and the extensive know-how at the Gotteszell site. The aim is to develop and offer an optimized product portfolio of milk measuring systems, cloud solutions and gas humidity measurement for worldwide distribution.
The name Ultrakust dates back to the Ultrakust electronics GmbH, which was acquired by BARTEC in 1996. Its former business units Food & BMS have been developed to global market leaders for milk measuring and data collection systems, as well as gas humidity sensors and contactless temperature measuring systems.
Ultrakust GmbH is part of the Division Mittelstandsbeteiligungen of Possehl Group, which specializes in majority investments in medium-sized enterprises in the DACH region and whose portfolio already contains companies of the food processing industry.
"The acquisition of BARTEC's FOOD division is an excellent opportunity for us to expand our growth to further customer segments. We want to offer the 37 new employees a safe perspective and long-term development opportunities," says Dr. Philipp Ernst Bringmann, member of the PMB management board.
In the future, the BARTEC site in Gotteszell will continue to be the location of BARTEC Benke GmbH with the two business units EHT (Electrical Heat Tracing) and PETRO with a total of about 135 employees. The two business units develop and produce, among others, electrical heat tracing systems for the protection of goods and processes in industry, housing and commerce and measuring technology for the precise and highly reliable dispensing of liquid chemicals.
In parallel, Ultrakust GmbH will maintain an independent company at the Gotteszell site. The purchase agreement of the FOOD division of BARTEC Benke GmbH to Ultrakust was signed on October 18, 2023. The closing is subject to the fulfilment of various contractual conditions.