Waste Connections Inc.Waste Connections Inc.

WORLD WASTES STAFF

With the completion of an initial public offering on May 22, 1998, Roseville, Calif.-based Waste Connections, which was founded only last year, burst into the public arena as an aggressive consolidator of small waste management companies in the western United States.

By the end of September 1998, the small-cap Waste Connections had annualized revenues of $80 million and expectations of reaching a $100 million run rate by the end of the year.

"Our three-year goal is to get to revenues of somewhere around $250 million by the end of the year 2000," says Ronald Mittelstaedt, president and chief executive officer of Waste Connections.

According to Melissa M. White, senior analyst for Piper Jaffray in Minneapolis, the Waste Connections' strategic plans include more than 300 potential acquisition targets with combined annual revenues of $1.5 billion.

Currently, Waste Connections owns 23 collection operations, two landfills, 10 transfer stations and three material recovery facilities, all of which serve approximately 185,000 commercial, industrial and residential customers.

It operates in nine Western states, including California, Idaho, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Dakota, Utah, Washington and Wyoming.

The company's acquisition strategy focuses exclusively on rural and suburban markets. "We're not in any urban markets and have no intention of being in urban markets," Mittelstaedt says. "We're happy in our little niche."