Oak Creek-based trucking company Ursa Logistics Inc. has agreed to be acquired by Peoria, Arizona-based alternative fuel services and transportation firm EVO Transportation & Energy Services Inc.
The agreement, reached Dec. 20, would pay out $2.5 million in cash, plus the assumption of Ursa’s undisclosed debt and a $6.4 million note from EVO at a 9 percent interest rate. The transaction is expected to close in early January.
Ursa is a contractor for the United States Postal Service based at 6925 S. Sixth St. near General Mitchell International Airport. It has 250 trucks and more than 400 employees, and focuses on the greater Midwest region. Its 2018 revenue is expected to be about $62 million.
As USPS works to consolidate its pool of contractors, EVO plans to help logistics companies compete by bringing several of them together, said John Yeros, chief executive officer of EVO.
“It’s our intention to acquire a number of these postal contractors to create a larger company that has more scale and can be more efficient,” Yeros said.
The location of Ursa makes strategic sense, since EVO is also in the process of acquiring Waterloo-based Sheehy Mail Contractors Inc., he said. That transaction is expected to close Jan. 2. Sheehy also has a location near Mitchell Airport.
“Between those two, we’ve got a pretty good presence and both of those facilities will be utilized and both of them will grow in size,” Yeros said. “We expect that location in Milwaukee to grow. We will consolidate other acquisitions we make into Milwaukee. We expect Milwaukee’s employee count to go up.”
“EVO’s mission to build a nationally recognized organization for USPS transportation services is a necessary step forward for the industry as contracts become increasingly more competitive to win,” said John Lampsa, founder and CEO of Ursa. “We believe being on the larger platform that EVO provides will allow us to capture more opportunities and expand the number of routes we currently operate. We look forward to joining the EVO team to rapidly grow our combined businesses.”
