Textile recycling start-up eeden closes € 18 million round

Müns­ter — German tech­no­logy start-up eeden, which has deve­lo­ped a breakth­rough textile recy­cling tech­no­logy, announ­ces the closing of its €18 million Series A finan­cing round. The round was led by Forbion, a leading venture capi­tal firm based in the Nether­lands, through its BioE­co­nomy Fund. Other new inves­tors include Henkel Ventures, the stra­te­gic venture capi­tal fund of Henkel, which has exten­sive exper­tise in surface and coating tech­no­lo­gies through its consu­mer and indus­trial busi­ness, and NRW.Venture, the venture fund of NRW.BANK, the deve­lo­p­ment bank of the state of North Rhine-Westphalia. 

All exis­ting inves­tors have reinves­ted in the round, inclu­ding venture capi­ta­lists Tech­Vi­sion Fund (TVF), High-Tech Grün­der­fonds (HTGF) and D11Z. Ventures — the early-stage invest­ment arm of Dieter Schwar­z’s family office. The finan­cing will enable eeden to build its demons­tra­tion plant in Müns­ter, opti­mize proces­sing on a large scale and estab­lish commer­cial projects with key play­ers in the textile industry. 

A big step towards a circu­lar economy

Ongo­ing chal­lenges such as rising costs, resource scar­city, mate­rial vola­ti­lity and growing regu­la­tory hurd­les conti­nue to plague the textile indus­try. To remain compe­ti­tive, brands and manu­fac­tu­r­ers are incre­asingly looking for textile mate­ri­als that offer high perfor­mance, scala­bi­lity and circu­la­rity at the same price. eeden addres­ses this need with its breakth­rough chemi­cal recy­cling tech­no­logy that reco­vers pure cellu­lose and PET buil­ding blocks (mono­mers) from cotton-poly­es­­ter blends. Its products can be used to produce virgin lyocell, viscose and poly­es­ter fibers, offe­ring a resource-effi­ci­ent alter­na­tive to conven­tio­nal fibers and opening up new circu­lar value chains. 

Alex Hoff­mann, Gene­ral Part­ner at Forbion (Photo: Forbion): “eeden has deve­lo­ped a ground-brea­king solu­tion that can make large-scale textile recy­cling not only tech­no­lo­gi­cally feasi­ble, but also commer­ci­ally viable in the near future. We see enorm­ous poten­tial in their approach and are deligh­ted to support the team in brin­ging this ground-brea­king tech­no­logy to indus­trial scale.”

“With its inno­va­tive tech­no­logy, eeden not only makes a valuable contri­bu­tion to conser­ving resour­ces in the textile indus­try, but also offers a commer­ci­ally attrac­tive busi­ness model in the long term,” says Florian Stin­auer, Invest­ment Mana­ger at NRW.Venture, who will also repre­sent the fund on the company’s advi­sory board. “With this invest­ment, we are further expan­ding our exis­ting port­fo­lio in the field of sustainable future technologies.” 

Stef­fen Gerlach, CEO & Co-Foun­­der of eeden: “Over the past years, we have deve­lo­ped a proven solu­tion that has the poten­tial to meet the indus­try’s long-term need for high-perfor­­mance, cost-effi­ci­ent and circu­lar mate­ri­als. We are proud that our new and exis­ting inves­tors believe in our approach and share our vision. With their support, we are ready to scale our tech­no­logy and turn textile waste into mate­ri­als that the indus­try really needs.”

eeden has deve­lo­ped a unique chemi­cal recy­cling process for mixed fibers that allows them to be reco­vered from old texti­les and used as raw mate­ri­als for new textile fibers. With its tech­no­logy, the start-up closes the textile cycle and redu­ces depen­dence on resource-inten­­sive raw mate­ri­als in this indus­try. The capi­tal from the current finan­cing round will enable the cons­truc­tion of a demons­tra­tion plant in Müns­ter, which repres­ents the next step on the way to indus­trial scaling of the recy­cling process. In addi­tion, commer­cial projects are to be reali­zed with key play­ers in the textile industry. 

With invest­ments such as this one, NRW.BANK speci­fi­cally streng­thens young compa­nies that contri­bute to the sustainable trans­for­ma­tion of the economy and society with their inno­va­tive solutions.

About eeden

eeden is a tech­no­logy company based in Müns­ter, Germany, pionee­ring the chemi­cal recy­cling of cotton-poly­es­­ter texti­les. Foun­ded in 2019, eeden has deve­lo­ped a breakth­rough tech­no­logy that effi­ci­ently sepa­ra­tes and reco­vers cellu­lose and PET mono­mers. These are proces­sed by fiber manu­fac­tu­r­ers into new lyocell, viscose and poly­es­ter fibers, enab­ling the tran­si­tion to a fully circu­lar textile indus­try. https://eeden.world

About Forbion

Forbion is a leading global venture capi­tal firm with exten­sive exper­tise in Europe and offices in Naar­den (Nether­lands), Munich (Germany) and Boston (USA). Forbion invests in inno­va­tive biotech compa­nies and mana­ges appro­xi­m­ately € 5 billion in various fund stra­te­gies cove­ring all phases of (bio)pharmaceutical drug deve­lo­p­ment. In addi­tion, Forbion lever­a­ges its biotech exper­tise beyond human health to address the chal­lenges of “plane­tary health” with its BioE­co­nomy fund stra­tegy, which invests in compa­nies deve­lo­ping sustainable solu­ti­ons in the areas of food, agri­cul­ture, mate­ri­als and envi­ron­men­tal tech­no­lo­gies. Forbi­o­n’s team of over 30 invest­ment profes­sio­nals has an impres­sive track record of 128 invest­ments across 11 funds since the late 1990s. Forbi­o­n’s track record in sourcing, buil­ding and mana­ging life science compa­nies has led to nume­rous appro­ved breakth­rough thera­pies and valuable exits. The company is a signa­tory to the United Nati­ons Prin­ci­ples for Respon­si­ble Invest­ment. Forbion opera­tes a joint venture with BGV, the mana­ger of seed and early-stage funds with a parti­cu­lar focus on the Bene­lux and Germany. 

About Henkel Ventures

Henkel Ventures is the corpo­rate venture capi­tal arm of Henkel and pursues a balan­ced approach with stra­te­gic focus and solid finan­cial returns. Henkel Ventures part­ners with start-ups for joint inno­va­tion and invests in early stage, late seed to B rounds in the areas of consu­mer products (CPG), adhe­si­ves tech­no­lo­gies, sustaina­bi­lity and digi­tal commerce. You can find more infor­ma­tion at Henkel Ventures 

About TVF

Tech­Vi­sion Fund (TVF) is a leading early-stage VC fund based in Aachen, Germany, focu­sing on tech­no­logy start-ups in the pre-seed to Series A stage. TVF focu­ses on outstan­ding teams from the Rhine­land region, inclu­ding the neigh­bor­ing Nether­lands and Belgium. TVF’s manage­ment has expe­ri­ence from four gene­ra­ti­ons of funds and curr­ently mana­ges assets of over 100 million euros. The funds are backed by strong inves­tors such as NRW.BANK, eight savings banks from western NRW and more than 15 successful entrepreneurs.
TVF supports start-up teams with its network and know-how and paves the way for them to become the next inter­na­tio­nal indus­try leader. Through the network of the S‑UBG Group, TVF offers unique access to over 150 successful compa­nies in various sectors and estab­lishes cont­acts between start-ups and their first custo­mers, part­ners and advi­sors. www.tvf.vc

About NRW.Venture

NRW.Venture is NRW.BANK’s venture capi­tal fund. It is the deve­lo­p­ment bank for North Rhine-West­pha­lia’s response to the shortage of finan­cing for young, inno­va­tive, often tech­­no­­logy-orien­­ted compa­nies that are often unable to obtain finan­cing through loans. Their main capi­tal consists of a new market idea, which makes it diffi­cult to assess their chan­ces of success. NRW.Venture invests up to EUR 15 million in such start-ups over seve­ral rounds — typi­cally from the second finan­cing round onwards — toge­ther with private-sector inves­tors. NRW.BANK takes mino­rity stakes over a period of three to seven years. Howe­ver, the commit­ment does not only comprise capi­tal — an expe­ri­en­ced team is the key to joint success. NRW.Venture’s invest­ment profes­sio­nals with many years of venture capi­tal expe­ri­ence, and often also tech­no­logy and start-up expe­ri­ence, use their know-how and network to ensure that start-ups have the best chan­ces of success. www.nrwbank.de