The sportswear brand Lululemon has led a $30 million funding round in the French startup Syntetica, which has developed a technology capable of recycling two types of nylon that are difficult to separate in textile waste.
The apparel company Lululemon has made a strong bet on the circular economy by investing in the French startup Syntetica, which has closed a Series A funding round of $30 million. The company has developed an innovative process to recycle nylon, a material that has previously posed significant challenges for reuse in the textile industry.
A solution for recycling nylon 6 and nylon 6,6
As explained by Syntetica's CEO, Marco Bertone, the startup's technology allows for the recycling of two types of nylon: Nylon 6 and Nylon 6,6. These materials are difficult to separate in the textile waste collected from consumers, which has limited their recycling until now. Syntetica's solution promises to change this reality.
The fashion industry generates millions of tonnes of waste each year, and nylon is one of the most problematic materials. With increasing pressure from consumers and environmental regulations, brands like Lululemon are looking to invest in circular solutions that reduce their ecological footprint.
We have built the company with the clarity that there is no green premium. If we want to scale real solutions for a sustainable world, it must be cost-competitive and highly scalable, Bertone stated.
Support from major brands and the public sector
In addition to Lululemon, Syntetica has other strategic partners such as Victoria’s Secret and Etam. The funding round has also been backed by the apparel manufacturer MAS Holdings, which Bertone considered a recognition of the magnitude of the problem facing the industry.
It is unusual for a supply chain player to invest in a player that has not yet scaled. However, before its Series A round, Syntetica had already closed a partnership with the Michelin Sustainable Materials Centre to establish a commercial demonstration facility in Clermont-Ferrand, France.
The startup plans to launch a recycling project to the market early next year. Unlike other companies in the sector, Syntetica will not produce textiles or a novel material, but its recycling process will generate pellets that others can use to create threads. It is a story of pragmatic industrial partnerships with the right players to gain support across the entire value chain, Bertone explained.
Cost competitiveness and global scalability
Bertone highlighted that changes in nylon prices, impacted by geopolitical turbulence in the oil industry, have been a wake-up call for many brands that have relied on petroleum-derived materials. This has led to an increase in demand for more sustainable solutions.
With experience in fashion and second-hand e-commerce, Bertone teamed up with chemical researcher Louis Monsigny through the Entrepreneur First accelerator. Together they established their collaboration in Reims, using the laboratory of AgroParisTech. Since then, they have hired a CTO, Ash Ward, who previously worked at the failed battery company Northvolt, whose co-founder, Peter Carlsson, is also one of Syntetica's advisors.
For Bertone, their experiences give them the wisdom to know when and where to take risks. As a startup, we must be comfortable taking more risks than industries; otherwise, there would be no innovation, he said. Therefore, Syntetica will not diversify its operations for now and will focus on demonstrating its ability to produce hundreds of tonnes of pellets per year and deliver them to customers in the apparel supply chain.
After achieving this goal, Bertone anticipates that Syntetica will build facilities around the world, close to waste sources and textile production. With global ambitions, the startup benefits from its base in France. Its Series A round was led by the Ecotechnologies 2 fund, managed by the Green Venture team of Bpifrance, France's public investment bank, as part of the France 2030 plan. It has also received support from the European Innovation Council (EIC) through capital, grants, and its acceleration programme.
For these public sponsors, startups like Syntetica are part of a broader plan to strengthen Europe's industrial capabilities while reducing dependence on fossil fuels. However, the startup also hopes to generate returns and has the backing of private investors such as EQT Ventures, SWEN Capital Partners, and family offices.
Syntetica also faces competition, including companies that use an enzymatic approach to eat plastics, as well as the chemical giant BASF, which has developed recycled nylon. Despite this, Bertone hopes that everyone will grow. If everyone managed to scale to dozens of factories, we still wouldn't solve this problem. Everyone needs to succeed for us to succeed as a society, he concluded.
Lululemon has also invested in other textile recycling startups, such as Epoch Biodesign and Samsara Eco.
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