At one of the daily lunches, the partners began talking, as they always did; only this time the conversation was about the future of the company. They asked themselves, what would happen when Børge Rambøll and Johan Hannemann were no longer with the company?
In other words, they began to talk about long-term ownership and how they could ensure the survival the company moving onwards. After discussing back and forth, it was decided based on a proposal of Børge Rambøll that Rambøll & Hannemann was to become a limited liability company – owned by a foundation.
Børge Johannes Rambøll shared his thoughts to his colleagues around the table:
“It could end in a fight between our children and the next generations, if we do not take action. Therefore, we have to make our company an independent foundation”.
Børge Johannes Rambøll’s and Johan Hannemann’s objective was to create an eternal company and a good workplace for as many as possible. Outside investors should not be able to profit from the company, and the revenue should be invested back into the companys development. Most importantly, they wanted the employees to feel ownership of the firm. With all this in mind, they sold the company to the Ramboll foundation.
Today, it is fairly common that Danish companies are owned by foundations. Nevertheless, Rambøll & Hannemann changed the scene, when they, as one of the first engineering consultancy companies were owned by a foundation.