Cycloon and bol.com today announced a proposed strategic partnership in which bol.com will become a shareholder of Cycloon. The parties jointly want to accelerate Cycloon's growth and share the ambition to make delivery more sustainable and social. Cycloon's current management will be continued and Cycloon's existing shareholders will remain involved as shareholders. The transaction, in which bol.com will acquire a majority stake, is expected to close in the first half of 2022 and is subject to relevant works council advice and customary approvals.
With the growth of the e-commerce and related logistics sector, the challenges in terms of delivery capacity and environmental and infrastructure impact are increasing. By collaborating with bol.com, Cycloon can substantially accelerate its mission to provide green and social services and create a future-proof position with strong growth opportunities in a competitive market. For bol.com, the collaboration ensures that a larger part of the packages can be delivered by bicycle and that the online retail platform can offer customers the best service in delivery.
Green and social
Management and shareholders remain fully committed to Cycloon's social culture and sustainable mission to grow the organization and create new employment. Cycloon uses its national network of bicycle couriers and postal deliverers to send mail and parcels throughout the Netherlands for thousands of customers. Cyclone does this in a smart way as much as possible, controlled by manpower and brown sandwiches. As a result, 1600 tons of CO2 are saved annually and 600 people with a (former) distance from the labor market are working at the company. Cycloon is looking forward to continuing postal and parcel delivery for current and new customers after the transaction, as well as delivering parcels for bol.com. This concerns both packages from bol.com itself and packages from sales partners who store their items in bol.com's distribution centers.
Strong basis for cooperation
What both companies have in common is the courage to do things differently. The mentality to work as a team and the no-nonsense culture. That is a very good basis for a successful collaboration.
“The collaboration with bol.com gives us the opportunity to make an impact on an even larger scale. We continue to invest in our people, the network and our partners, which enables us to improve and further expand the services for our current and new customers. We discussed extensively the principles that we stand for and will continue to stand for as organizations.”
Bol.com has ambitious sustainability goals and the collaboration with Cycloon makes a substantial contribution to this. “We strongly believe in Cycloon's sustainable and social mission. At the same time, it is a unique opportunity for bol.com and its sales partners to accelerate the sustainability of our growing parcel delivery and expand our delivery capacity. We can also further improve convenience and service for our customers with flexible and smart delivery. Working towards a sustainable and socially responsible last mile is critical to the future of e-commerce and we will continue to work with all our delivery partners to make this a reality. With the majority interest in Cycloon, we are taking another step towards our stated ambition to reduce our direct footprint to 2025 grams of CO0 emissions per package by 2.”
Conditions and process
The transaction is subject to customary conditions, including approval from the competition authority, coordination with the unions and advice from the relevant works council. The transaction is expected to close in the first half of 2022, subject to all conditions being met. Four years after the transaction, bol.com will also acquire the remaining shares. Cyclone will then continue to exist as an independent brand, according to Bol.com.
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