Cold Jet enters investment partnership with two firms

Cold Jet LLC officials entered into an investment partnership with two financial firms that will help the dry ice technology company grow in the life sciences market and meet demand from manufacturers making operational improvements to achieve sustainability goals.

The Loveland, Ohio-based company's new partners are Seidler Equity Partners, with headquarters in Marina del Rey, Calif., and Stonehenge Partners, a Columbus, Ohio-based private equity fund focused on lower middle market companies.

The partnership will let Cold Jet focus on new product development, take advantage of acquisition opportunities and expand in some business segments, according to Cold Jet President and CEO Gene Cooke III.

Founded in 1988, Cold Jet's two distinct lines of business are centered on the use of dry ice as a so-called blasting medium for manufacturers and a cold-transport medium for food and, more recently, medical products.

Cold Jet provides environmental cleaning, surface preparation and parts finishing systems to plastics processors as well as systems to produce, meter and package dry ice for food and life science applications.

Both lines of the business are poised for growth, Cooke said in a phone interview.

"The real-time maintenance of the tooling used to produce plastic and composite forms is a major application area," Cooke said. "There aren't many alternatives to Cold Jet for cleaning process equipment in place during the manufacturing process without disassembly and without generating any secondary waste stream. That's a foundation of our business now and going forward."

The use of dry ice as a blasting material puts recycled carbon dioxide to work instead of water, which allows companies to meet sustainability goals.

"Water is a precious resource and every company is obligated to use it less and return it in an improved cleaner state than when they got it," Cooke said. "We have a robust product development agenda underscored by this global industrialized world discovery and orientation toward environmental sustainability. With Cold Jet, manufacturers no longer need to use water in the maintenance of critical tooling whether it's used to produce pet food or pickup trucks."

The increased demand for Cold Jet's other product line — dry ice manufacturing systems — emerged shortly after the COVID-19 pandemic was declared in March 2020. Cold Jet already had customers in the food industry. Then, some major pharmaceutical companies turned to the business for vaccine delivery.

"The vaccine strategy has mRNA as the baseline protein and that requires cold chain management from the point of manufacture to the point of use," Cooke said. "The critical need to keep that vaccine at an ultra-low temperature until its injected in you and I precipitated a whole new demand for Cold Jet products."

Cold Jet's entry into the life sciences market also is generating business from contract research organizations and for cell therapy applications.

As an essential business during the pandemic, Cold Jet went on a hiring spree to fill orders and now has 300 employees at three manufacturing plants in Cincinnati, Ohio; Bramming, Denmark; and Oborniki, Poland, and distribution facilities and sales and service offices around the world.

The company hired Harris Williams, a subsidiary of the PNC Financial Services Group Inc., to advise it on the investment transaction.

The partnership will bring Cold Jet a new board of managers, more insight into best practices and the financial backing to jump at opportunities.

"In terms of governance, the company will be transformed," Cooke said. "There are multiple facets to the investment and why it is beneficial for the company as we continue our journey."