Lineage Logistics completes Emergent Cold acquisition

The world’s largest cold storage provider grows its footprint to more than 1.9 billion cubic feet

Emergent Cold facility (Photo: Emergent)

Lineage Logistics, the world’s largest temperature-controlled logistics provider, announced the completion of its acquisition of Emergent Cold.

The transaction was originally expected to add 46 facilities throughout the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Vietnam and Sri Lanka to Lineage’s network. The deal includes New Orleans Cold Storage, which Emergent acquired earlier in 2019, and its four port facilities in New Orleans, Houston and Charleston. The transaction also includes newly constructed distribution centers near Dallas-Fort Worth and Piura, Peru.

Emergent Cold is the largest cold chain provider in Australia, with more than 75 million cubic feet of storage space and over 300,000 pallet positions.

Financial terms were not disclosed, but the Wall Street Journal originally reported the deal to be valued at more than $900 million. The deal was first announced at the end of 2019.

“Welcoming Emergent Cold and New Orleans Cold Storage to the Lineage family provides a dramatically expanded footprint of facilities in the Asia-Pacific region and further connects our customers’ global supply chains through one network as a result,” said Mike McClendon, Lineage’s President of International Operations and Executive Vice President of Network Optimization. 

Novi, Michigan-based Lineage has been on an acquisition hot streak of late, purchasing Northeast food service distributor Maines Paper and Food Service and Pacific Northwest warehousing and transportation provider Henningsen Cold Storage in recent weeks.

In aggregate, Lineage’s network now includes more than 300 facilities and 1.9 billion cubic feet of cold storage in 12 countries throughout North America, South America, Europe, Asia, Australia and New Zealand.

Lineage is backed by private equity firm Bay Grove Capital.

“We continue to be laser-focused on strategically and intentionally growing the business to provide the most expansive and innovative logistics services in the world. The close of this transaction is an important step in building our Asia-Pacific platform and unlocks new doors for Lineage’s customers,” said Co-Founder of Lineage Logistics and Managing Partner of Bay Grove Kevin Marchetti.

Click for more FreightWaves articles by Todd Maiden.

Upcoming FreightWaves Events
Fraud & Security

Freight Fraud Symposium

Double brokering. AI deepfakes. Identity theft. Freight fraud is an existential threat to the industry. Get ahead of it.

May 20, 2026
Rock & Roll Hall of Fame • Cleveland, OH
Register Now
AI & Technology

Supply Chain AI Symposium

Past the hype. Join operators, founders, and enterprise leaders figuring out how to deploy AI in supply chain.

July 15, 2026
The Old Post Office • Chicago, IL
Register Now
Rail & Policy

Future of Rail Symposium

Reshoring is rewriting freight demand. Join shippers, rail executives, and government officials to shape the next decade.

July 28, 2026
The Signal at Chattanooga Choo Choo • Chattanooga, TN
Register Now
Fraud & Security Freight Fraud Symposium May 20 • Cleveland, OH

Double brokering. AI deepfakes. Identity theft. Freight fraud is an existential threat to the industry. Get ahead of it.

Rock & Roll Hall of Fame • Cleveland, OH Register Now
AI & Technology Supply Chain AI Symposium Jul 15 • Chicago, IL

Past the hype. Join operators, founders, and enterprise leaders figuring out how to deploy AI in supply chain.

The Old Post Office • Chicago, IL Register Now
Rail & Policy Future of Rail Symposium Jul 28 • Chattanooga, TN

Reshoring is rewriting freight demand. Join shippers, rail executives, and government officials to shape the next decade.

The Signal at Chattanooga Choo Choo • Chattanooga, TN Register Now

Todd Maiden

Based in Richmond, VA, Todd is the finance editor at FreightWaves. Prior to joining FreightWaves, he covered the TLs, LTLs, railroads and brokers for RBC Capital Markets and BB&T Capital Markets. Todd began his career in banking and finance before moving over to transportation equity research where he provided stock recommendations for publicly traded transportation companies.