ESG and sustainability initiatives are at the forefront of investors’ minds as industries everywhere undergo major transformations. M&A must navigate a tightrope of investing in firms that can both create value and help promote a better world to live and work in. It looks like the waste and recycling industries are the next areas to see these ESG transformations in effect.

Allied Industrial Partners has made a $150 million strategic investment in Waste Eliminator, a regional provider of solid waste hauling, disposal, and recycling services for commercial, industrial, and government waste generators within the Atlanta-Metro area. Waste Eliminator delivers critical, non-discretionary, turn-key waste management and recycling services with a concentration on re-usability and sustainability. Waste Eliminator’s recycling and waste re-usability services establish the firm as a “go-to” provider in assisting its clients to achieve sustainability goals.

“The disposal and recycling industry is undergoing major transformations as companies evolve to implement practical and sustainable practices that reduce the amount of waste going to landfills,” Bradford Rossi and Philip Wright, co-founders and managing partners of AIP tell Mergers & Acquisitions. “We also like that waste disposal and recycling is a critical service, and therefore nondiscretionary from a customer perspective. This backdrop and our team’s heritage of operating, investing in, and growing industrial businesses make it a great fit and an attractive industry for investment.”

Allied says that the firm is working on two acquisitions that will add critical assets to the platform. The firm looks to build on the platform on the belief that, “More thoughtful investment in Waste Eliminator will lead to more scale, with the effect that more waste is being diverted from landfills, which supports global sustainability efforts.”

It is evident that dealmakers across the country are pointing their crosshairs at firms that can inject an element of ESG responsibility into their communities.

-Cole Lipsky