At Work With Water: Matt Martin, EDI

At Work With Water is a series focusing on the incredible people who are making a difference for water. In each edition of XPV Water Partners’ newsletter, we’ll speak with a person from one of our portfolio companies who is doing things differently – ensuring that the water sector continues to evolve, thrive, and meet global challenges with innovative solutions.   

With decades of experience in wastewater and energy sectors, Matt Martin recently joined EDI as General Manager. We spoke to Matt about his career, EDI’s role in a water secure future, and his top priorities for growing the company as part of Axius Water, the global nutrient management platform developed by XPV Water Partners and KKR. 

You’ve had an extensive career in engineering and global sales. Can you tell us a bit about your journey to this point? 

Over the last two decades, I’ve had the pleasure of enabling customers with creative technical solutions in the wastewater and energy markets here in North America and globally. 

I started my career as a young engineer at Turblex and was privileged to learn from legends like Guy Mace and Rich Vinton, who were pioneers in blowers and aeration control optimization. Later in my career, I leveraged my technical and operational foundation and transitioned to commercial roles, which allowed me to work collaboratively with customers to solve difficult challenges associated with providing clean and sustainable energy.  

These experiences prepared me to lead businesses. In a full circle, I returned to the wastewater market and led Turblex through an integration with Chart Water. 

Tell us about your decision to join EDI. What excites you most about this opportunity?  

That was easy. When I was introduced to Chris McIntire and Martin Hildebrand, I knew I wanted to be part of their mission to build a water quality platform. Chris and Martin really know the industry; I learn so much from them. EDI feels like home and has an incredible legacy founded on understanding our customers and applying technology to fit their needs. I’m excited to build upon that legacy and continue to innovate and grow, especially as EDI celebrates 50 years in the industry. In that time, the company has served almost half a billion people worldwide!  

How are EDI and Axius Water contributing to a water secure future? 

EDI is a leader in aeration technologies for biological treatment in municipal and industrial treatment plants. With engineered solutions, installation, service, and parts, EDI’s “Aeration for Life” promise ensures support throughout the full life cycle of any aeration project.  

In addition, Axius Water now has a newly formed sustainability council with representatives across all the businesses, including EDI. We are working to better understand opportunities around how we can reduce the carbon footprint of our operations, and how we can better enable our customers to reduce harmful levels of nutrients in waterways, meet evolving regulatory requirements, and serve aging infrastructure.   

As one of the company’s leaders, can you speak about how the team approaches building the business? What are your top priorities in the coming year or two?  

We strive to create a vision and guiding principles that assist us in our daily decision making that will empower, unify, and drive a culture of trust. We build the business by working on the business, not just working in it. We have strategic initiatives that focus on a greater reach to our customers, serving our installed base, and operational excellence.  

Since joining EDI, I’ve had the privilege to be mentored by John Coburn, the Operating Partner at XPV Water Partners. John has worked side by side with me to develop and refine our growth and operating plans, sharing his extensive success over an incredibly meaningful career. 

Moving forward, EDI’s priorities include leveraging our more than 8,000 aerations systems globally to provide aftermarket parts and world-class services. We are actively evaluating factory automation that will improve output, efficiencies, and quality while reducing costs. We will continue to drive technology and standardization to innovate our products that will simplify operations and enhance our customers’ experience.   

How do you see EDI benefiting from being part of the Axius Water platform? 

Axius Water’s theme “Stronger Together” really articulates our approach.  Working in partnership with the platform’s other operating companies allows us to tap into collective knowledge, expertise, tools, and resources to solve our customers’ challenges. We regularly share best practices and processes. We’ve been able to expand our presence into new regions. We tackle challenges together. Leveraging the platform helps us reach and stay closer to our customers and operate our business with greater visibility.   

How does EDI’s vision align with your personal values and outlook? 

EDI’s core values focus on family, customers, collaboration, integrity, and perseverance.  As we develop these foundational values in our teams and our business, we recognize how living them helps us work together to win. I’m passionate about helping individuals, teams, and businesses unlock and reach their greatest potential. At EDI and within Axius Water, we are given the opportunity to do this and to make meaningful change in support of a healthy and sustainable environment.