Equipment Report

Investment firm acquires majority stake in CP Group

Declaration Partners, a New York-based private investment firm, has acquired a majority stake in San Diego-based sorting equipment manufacturer CP Group.

CP Group says the partnership represents a milestone in its 50-year evolution as a company, providing the capital foundation and resources necessary to accelerate innovation, expand operational capabilities and strengthen the company’s position within the waste and recycling industry.

The partnership enables CP Group to expand its engineering and research capabilities, with planned investments in advanced automation technologies, artificial intelligence (AI) integration and next generation sorting systems. CP Group says these investments will strengthen its ability to deliver high recovery rates, operational efficiency and economic value to customers while addressing emerging needs and trends in the industry.

Declaration says it views CP Group as a platform for growth, with both organic growth drivers and potential add-on acquisition opportunities.

Within the industrials space, Declaration has partnered with management teams of other platform companies, including Enstructure, an operator of marine terminals; New Frontier Materials, a provider of aggregates and asphalt; and LMI, a tech-enabled consultancy to the U.S. government.

“We are delighted to partner with the CP Group leadership team to support the company’s next chapter of growth,” says Charles Rayner, partner at Declaration. “The long-term market trends and opportunity for meaningful innovation make CP a great fit for family office investment, which is why we have reserved significant additional capital to support the company in the coming years. We will maintain and expand the company’s USA-based manufacturing, which provides superior durability and cutting-edge automation. CP is now even better positioned to help solve customer and industry challenges holistically.”

Lindemann proposes equipment service subscriptions

Alexander Zinn, director of global sales and marketing at Lindemann Metal Recycling, says the equipment provider has identified an opportunity “not just to sell machines but to help customers unlock lasting value from them.”

He says the approach could involve a change to the Lindemann Metal Recycling business model.

“At Lindemann, we are developing a subscription-based service, one that bundles wear parts, maintenance, analytics and technology upgrades into a single monthly fee,” Zinn says. “The aim is to provide peace of mind and predictable costs for customers while at the same time ensuring machines always operate at peak efficiency.”

The Germany-based maker of shredding and baling equipment, which has North American operations in San Antonio, identifies data tied to operational costs as a driver leading it to the new business model.

“Today, we are an equipment supplier, but we want to become a performance partner to our customers— focusing on reducing their real operational costs, especially cost per ton,” Zinn says in a July news release. “Instead of selling a machine and walking away, the company is committing to a long-term, data-driven partnership that helps customers squeeze more value out of every ton of scrap they process.”

He lists energy, labor, downtime, maintenance and throughput as factors affecting operators’ cost per ton.

“Not every customer knows their exact cost per ton, so we’ve developed a comprehensive tool that helps map all the relevant factors,” Zinn says. “That gives us a baseline from which to build a business case for improvements.”

Establishing cost per ton, Zinn says, can allow Lindemann and the customer to identify the most cost-effective upgrades that can slash that figure and thereby boost customer profitability.

Equipment could be part of the solution, he adds, pointing to a preshredder that could reduce wear and tear on an existing shredder, a frequency inverter to cut energy consumption or a Lindemann Shredder Drive Assistant that could increase throughput.

Via the subscription service, Zinn says, Lindemann can collect data, and the supplier’s staff members can “sit down regularly with our customers, study the data together and build strategies to help them improve.”

TecknTrash Robotics, Sharp Group partner on humanoid robot pilot

TeknTrash Robotics, a United Kingdom-based company pioneering artificial intelligence- (AI-) powered robotics and motion intelligence for the waste management and recycling industry, has partnered with Sharp Group, a leading environmental services provider in the U.K., to test ALPHA (Automated Litter Processing Humanoid Assistant), a humanoid robot designed to sort waste and recyclables.

Sharp Group’s facility in Rainham, East London, processes 2,800 metric tons of material per week, including plastic, paper, glass, metal, stone and more. Frontline workers have been equipped with virtual reality Meta Quest 3 headsets that record their movements during daily operations. Using an app developed by TeknTrash, Sharp Group workers are capturing detailed motion data—including posture, hand and finger articulation—and synchronized video to train AI robotic models.

Through the partnership, which began in April, data will be captured for six months. After passing quality metrics, the data will be fed into NVIDIA Isaac Lab, a leading robot training platform, to generate a model that will feed back into an ALPHA humanoid, mimicking the same movements. The humanoid robot can take over sorting tasks that are repetitive, unsanitary and hazardous, TeknTrash says.

In addition to automation, ALPHA enables real-time, item-level material data collection. Having accurate insights across the material stream will enable recycling operators and policymakers to comply with extended producer responsibility regulations, track material flows from cradle to grave, conduct detailed carbon accounting, support circular economy strategies with evidence-based decisions and improve environmental, social and governance and sustainability reporting, TeknTrash says.

Unlike traditional solutions that use stationary robotic arms, ALPHA is built for mobility, dexterity and perception, trained to mirror human hands and precision, TeknTrash says.

Once testing has concluded, Sharp Group will serve as the launchpad for ALPHA’s broader rollout across the U.K. and Europe, according to the technology provider.