05-05-2025
DePoly Secures $23M to Open New PET Recycling Facility
Swiss PET and polyester recycler DePoly plans to scale up its operation in a major way. The company landed $23 million in seed funding from MassMutual Ventures that will allow DePoly to finish and open a 500-metric-ton-per-year recycling showcase plant in Monthey, Switzerland this summer.
The facility will demonstrate DePoly's proprietary process to convert PET and polyester waste into virgin-quality raw materials without the use of fossil fuels. DePoly has worked with fashion and cosmetic companies such as Swiss apparel brand Odlo to use its recycled fibers, and it said this plant will allow them to reach new partners.
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'The upcoming showcase plant validates our roadmap to creating a truly circular plastics market,' said Samantha Anderson, co-founder and CEO of DePoly. 'Following our pilot and showcase plant, our next goal is to scale our operations to industrial size with a first of a kind commercial plant based on our technology.'
DePoly focuses on items that often go un-recycled due to complex blends, contaminants or dyes, processing dirty, unsorted, end-of-life plastics and fibers into virgin-grade raw materials. The company uses green chemicals and operates at room temperature to reduce energy consumption and the need to pre-wash materials.
The MassMutual Ventures investment comes at the close of a significant fundraising period for DePoly, which has raised more than $30 million total across two rounds of fundraising and through grants. MassMutual Ventures joins existing investors, including Founderful, ACE & Company, Angel Invest, Zürcher Kantonalbank, BASF Venture Capital, Beiersdorf Venture Capital and Syensqo.
'DePoly's proven technology is a game-changer addressing a crucial industrial and societal challenge,' said Alix Brunet, Europe Lead at MassMutual Ventures. 'This raise and the showcase plant opening are advancing DePoly's position as a leader in plastics recycling.'
With this funding and the new facility, DePoly stands as one of the largest recycling technology companies in Europe. The company's process for delivering oil-equivalent monomers earned DePoly a Technology Pioneer award from the World Economic Forum, and in 2023, the recycler was chosen by Fashion for Good to participate in its innovation program.
CFO David Hanf said these new investments will allow them to expand their technology to a commercial scale.
'We are convinced our technology is one of the fastest to scale and will allow us to compete with virgin pricing at scale, a key factor for success,' he said. 'We are happy to have expanded our investor base to the U.S. with MassMutual Ventures as we want to build a global champion.'
