29-year-old Jeppe Pommer Lykkegaard has acquired 49% of the shares in the pump company Lykkegaard A/S. This marks the beginning of the process for the 5th generation of the Lykkegaard family to eventually lead the Ferritslev-based company.

At the beginning of 2025, two 58-year-old twin pumps were brought in for repair at Lykkegaard A/S's workshop in Ferritslev, Funen. These pumps were produced and installed in Rørvig in 1967 by Hans and Knud Lykkegaard and their employees. Shortly after, Hans' son Bent took over the company.

This year, Bent's son, 67-year-old Karsten Lykkegaard, received the order, arranged for the pumps to be collected, and helped assess them. The solution was to reuse the pump parts that were still functional, which amounted to almost one pump, and then build a completely new one to the same specifications.

When the pumps return to the factory for service and repair in the future, it will most likely be Karsten's son, Bent's grandson, and Hans' great-grandson, Jeppe Pommer Lykkegaard, who will be leading the company.

The generational transition process has just begun, with Jeppe Lykkegaard ready to become the 5th generation in the Lykkegaard company. In 2025, he acquired 49% of the shares and a seat on the company's board.

"I chose to take over myself. It was a natural step, but my parents were clear that it was my choice and had to be a deliberate decision. I grew up at the factory and enjoy developing products and finding new and better solutions. So, it is a natural step for me to eventually take over the entire factory," says Jeppe Lykkegaard.

The plan is for him to eventually take over both the remaining shares and the CEO position from his father. However, no date has been set for this yet, says the current CEO, Karsten Lykkegaard.

"We want a long and smooth generational transition, where we work together until I am ready to retire and Jeppe is ready to take the CEO position. We can easily spend several years on this," says Karsten Lykkegaard, who still enjoys coming to work every day but is also looking forward to stepping back a bit:

"Jeppe is really talented and has already developed the company in ways I cannot. I know a lot about pumps, but I don't understand the new technologies. As long as he enjoys developing and exploring new workflows, it's fine that I handle all the phone calls and contact with our old customers," says Karsten Lykkegaard.

Developing More Energy-Efficient Pumps

Jeppe Lykkegaard is trained as an industrial technician and later as a mechanical engineer and has worked at the company for the past few years. Among other things, he has overseen a restructuring of propeller production, so they are no longer cast in either Sweden or Denmark but instead designed and milled in one piece on an advanced machine, a so-called five-axis machining centre at the factory.

The new propellers have several advantages. First and foremost, they are more precise and can be optimised in detail for the exact amount of water they need to move. This means they use less electricity to move the same amount of water and are therefore energy-saving.

Tests at Lykkegaard's test centre show that a pump typically saves 5-7% electricity to move the same amount of water using the new propellers compared to the cast ones.

Additionally, it also saves CO2 in production, as the materials are no longer transported over long distances. Last but not least, the employees at the factory no longer have to polish the propellers, which produced metal dust that was not optimal for the working environment.

Quality and Sustainability in the DNA

Jeppe Lykkegaard grew up at the factory and is completely aligned with his father, grandfather, great-grandfather, and great-great-grandfather in that what is produced at the factory must be of high quality and last for many years.

"We often receive pumps for repair that are 60 years old. The new pumps we produce are produced with the aim at also lasting that long. Lykkegaard has never been a throwaway product, and we should not become one. I would much rather produce quality pumps that are cheap to operate and last a long time than produce some that are cheaper to acquire but easily break," says Jeppe Lykkegaard.

The family business Lykkegaard A/S was founded in 1883 by Niels Hansen in Ferritslev on Funen. He grew up in agriculture and was skilled in mechanics. He wanted to ease the farmers' hard work and therefore invented, among other things, a throwing machine and a sowing machine.

With the same motivation, he began building wind motors and mills. His sons Hans and Knud Lykkegaard followed in his footsteps when they took over the factory from him in 1932. They expanded to also produce windmill-driven drainage pumps.

Today, the pumps are electric motor-driven and are the company's primary focus, and pumps are delivered worldwide, both for drainage, which was the original task, and in recent years, the industry and especially the global fishing industry have become some of the factory's major customers.

100 Years of Profit

The company has always had a profit in its accounts – and as part of its written values, it only grows with its own funds. Therefore, there are no gazelles on the shelves – but several other awards such as the Apprenticeship of the Year at Dansk Metal, Company of the Year at Faaborg-Midtfyn Business Council, and other recognitions that have come over the years.

And there are no plans for groundbreaking changes here either:

"We want to grow, but it must be so that we can keep up and maintain the same high quality. The biggest challenge in recent years has actually been attracting qualified labour, so we have outsourced some of our tasks to meet our goals," says Jeppe Lykkegaard.