Member Article

£197k investment brings specialist tanker to Tesside

A Teesside-based, environmental services company has taken delivery of a specialised tanker, aided by a £197k investment from UK Steel Enterprise.

The tanker, manufactured in Germany and costing around a quarter of a million pounds, is the latest acquisition in a multi-million pound expansion project by Mantank Environmental Services Ltd.

UK Steel Enterprise provided a £100k loan plus a £97,000 grant available thanks to support from the government’s Regional Growth Fund.

Mantank expanded into the North East from Manchester and operates from a four acre site at Stockton. It has plans to create around 23 new jobs in the next two years to add to the existing workforce of 25 following a string of contract wins that includes a substantial one with UK Steel Enterprise’s parent company Tata Steel.

With services that include industrial, site and tank cleaning, dewatering and waste reduction the company is widely recognised for its expertise in dealing with hazardous waste and noxious chemicals as well as plant decommissioning.

It operates around the UK and internationally for a large number of blue-chip customers and turnover is expected to reach £8.5m in the first half of 2016.

General Manager Richard Valks said: “This investment from UK Steel Enterprise has been vital as it helped us to purchase land and buy equipment including this powerful tanker from Germany. It is capable of dealing with materials that include heavy sludge and bricks and will help us to attract new customers as well as meeting growing demand from existing ones.

“We recognise that we need to invest to ensure we have equipment with the highest possible specification and that our workforce, dealing with hazardous wastes and strict environmental controls, is highly trained.

“The grant element of the UKSE investment is particularly welcome. The company has no history of working with investors and the whole process has been less complicated and time-taking than we imagined,” he added.

Sarah Thorpe, Regional Executive for UK Steel Enterprise, said: “Mantank is a well-established company with a strong order book and significant growth potential. We are only too pleased to support a company that meets all our criteria, is investing heavily in the region and creating valuable jobs.”

Simon Wake, Partner at Endeavour Partnership, providers of commercial legal services to businesses across Teesside and beyond, introduced the company to UK Steel Enterprise.

“We have been closely involved with Mantank since they moved to Teesside,” he said. “This is not the first time we have introduced a client seeking investment to UK Steel Enterprise and we are pleased that the company secured the finance it needs to continue its successful growth.”