TEXTILES.ORG
Ravel, a textile-to-textile recycling technology company, has announced the closure of an oversubscribed $8.2 million seed funding round. The investment was led by One Small Planet, with participation from AP Ventures plus support from Overlay Capital and Lichen Ventures. Collateral Good and Betterway Ventures also provided follow-on participation, among others.
Ravel’s Purification Recycling™ technology was designed to address the industry’s biggest unsolved challenges: valorizing hard-to-recycle blends that make up the vast majority of modern clothing, and avoiding disruption in existing supply chains.
“There are countless advantages to blended fiber materials for clothing, blends are what make clothing durable, functional, and affordable. But blends are not recyclable with existing infrastructure. That’s where Ravel comes in. We’re solving a huge problem that other technologies fail to address.” says Zahlen Titcomb, CEO of Ravel.
Ravel’s process isolates inseparable mixtures like poly-elastane, a popular combination for performance clothing, and purifies waste into mono-material fiber using non-destructive, low-energy processes.
“Ravel offers a rare opportunity in recycling: a clear pathway to producing recycled materials that are cheaper than their virgin counterparts. The logic is elegant on a first-principles basis, positioning Ravel to solve one of the most pressing problems in the circular economy. The company’s technology transforms complex material blends into virgin-quality feedstock, creating a transparent, low-carbon, cost-effective supply chain, and opening the door for more global industries to adopt circular models,” says Jack Wielebinski at One Small Planet
As Ravel expands from its Seattlem Wash., pilot plant to commercial-scale operations, the company is focused on validating its technology across the textile supply chain and demonstrating its performance at production scale. With Extended Producer Responsibility legislation increasing the responsibility of brands and manufacturers for textile waste, Ravel is actively seeking industry partners to validate blended textile waste as a feedstock and to integrate Ravel’s materials into existing manufacturing supply chains.
For more information about Ravel, visit RavelFuture.com.