Page 76 from: May 2007

In December last year, Irish group One51 effec-tively issued a statement of intent with its multi-
million Euro acquisition of an 80% shareholding in
Swiss recycling company Immark and its sister
companies Drisa Entsorgungs AG and Swissglas
AG. Previously an investor in One51, Immark is a
Euro 40 million turnover business specialising in
recycling waste electrical and electronic equipment
(WEEE) – an area in which One51 is striving to
carve out a substantial world presence.

With One51’s e-scrap recycling operations now
coming under the Immark banner, the plan is to set
up WEEE recycling plants in co-operation with
local partners in a number of key markets. The aim
is to provide the electrical and electronic equipment
industry with an international network of recycling
solutions and other services related to waste man-
agement.

One51 confirmed last summer that it had raised
Euro 120 million (US$ 156 million) to fund acquisi-
tions in Ireland’s waste and wind energy sectors.
Describing itself as an infrastructure, niche waste,
e-scrap recycling and waste-to-energy group valued
at around Euro 800 million (US$ 1.04 billion), the
Immark deal has given One51 ‘control of probably
the most sophisticated e-scrap recycler in the
world’, according to One51’s Gerry Killen who has
become Managing Director of Immark’s e-waste
division which currently turns over some Euro 50
million (US$ 65 million) per annum.

The Irish group spent between Euro 150 and 200
million last year on around a dozen acquisitions,
including glass/dry recyclables specialist Glasdon
and plastics recycler Protech, both of which are
based in Ireland. ‘One51 will most probably acquire
a further 12-15 companies this year – a lot of them
in niche waste businesses and maybe four to six in
e-scrap recycling,’ declares Mr Killen.

Group e-scrap plants already in operation are
located at: Zurich, Basel, Mulheim and Rothrist in
Switzerland; Aachen and Stuttgart in Germany;
and Dublin and Dungannon in Ireland. One51 is
planning to open its first Italian e-scrap processing
facility in Milan later this year while two further
plants in Europe will either be acquired or opened
during the course of 2007.

Wider ambitions

However, One51’s ambitions lie well beyond
Europe: for example, following three years of
research, the company has recently signed a joint
venture agreement with a local partner to build an e-
scrap processing facility north of Shanghai in China.
According to Mr Killen, his group will have a control-
ling interest in the new company and the plant
‘should be operational before the end of the year’.

And he adds: ‘We are also now looking at a very
exciting opportunity near Beijing which, because the

C O M P A N Y P R O F I L E

Recycling International • May 2007 76

One51 puts down a W
Billion-dollar Irish group One51 has money to spend and a clear

desire to make major connections in the electrical and electronic

scrap recycling sector. Following its recent acquisition of Immark,

the group already boasts a substantial market presence in Europe

and plans to extend this coverage in the very near future. And the

group is also well advanced in laying foundations for growth on the

world stage.

By Ian Martin

TechRec’s CRT line for cleaning, cutting and
separating panel and funnel glass which is
subsequently sold for reuse in new cathode
ray tube (CRT) screens.

TechRec Ireland operates a recycling plant for
small appliances and IT equipment in Dublin.

The heart of TechRec’s WEEE-shredding
process is a Querstromzerspaner (QZ)
machine from Germany-based MeWa
Recycling Maschinen und Anlagenbau which
breaks up rather than shred the WEEE.

RI_039 WEE-One51:Opmaak 1 02-05-2007 12:07 Pagina 76