GENERAL INDUSTRIES’ industrial adventure is still in its youth, with the creation of the 1.08 RECYCLAGE plant. The meeting and subsequent minority investment by the TERTIUM entrepreneurial fund in early 2022 represents a major milestone.

Today, we’d like to find out more from Romain GERLA, one of our key contacts at TERTIUM.

Can you tell us more about TERTIUM?

TERTIUM defines itself more as a fund of entrepreneurs than a traditional investment fund, in the sense that it brings together some thirty business leaders, mainly based in the South of France, driven by an entrepreneurial spirit above all else, to help regional SMEs reach new milestones in their development. Under the aegis of our two co-founders, Pierre GRAND-DUFAY and Stéphane ASSUIED, we carry out development capital and buy-out operations.

How did your initial discussions with GENERAL INDUSTRIES go?

From the very first meeting, we were convinced that we had come across an innovative idea, an industrial project at the crossroads between the challenges of ecological transition, the circular economy and the country’s reindustrialization. All against a backdrop of changing international regulations, which, to put it simply, will prohibit the export of plastic waste outside the European Union from the beginning of 2021 and the signing of a new amendment to the Basel Convention.

How did this project immediately strike you as revolutionary and realistic?

The explanation of the 3 successive phases of scrap processing leading to the production of recycled pellets was so clear, so simple, that we were immediately hooked. We said to ourselves: “That’s just great!”. The thought that, once reprocessed, the plastic waste from a computer screen or coffee maker, for example, could be “reincarnated” into another everyday object won us over.

A project like this is also a meeting of minds with the management team. How did you feel about it?

We were very quickly won over by the project team, all recognized waste professionals, motivated by the desire to make a difference in this environmental issue linked to climate change, and our dependence on fossil fuels. On the one hand, teams with a unique technical mastery of the processes to be implemented, and on the other, professionals in the post-consumer plastics trade with a unique address book. Everything was in place to make it work, as we can now see!

Would you do it again?

As a minority shareholder, we obviously have a very close relationship. So there are other development prospects in sight, especially internationally. And it’s a pleasure to be working alongside manufacturers who have dared to enter a market that no one had anticipated to such an extent. They set out to create the 1.08 RECYCLAGE plant, at the right time, with a good “in-house” solution, to find their way and create their market. Congratulations to the whole team!

 

Thank you Romain GERLA!