Fashion for Good has selected 14 new start-up innovators to join their Accelerator Programme’s eighth batch. Almost half of them are using bio-based approaches for more sustainable materials.
A total of 22 innovators pitched their solutions to Fashion for Good partners during a virtual Selection Day. With solutions in raw materials, processing, end-of-use, digital acceleration, plastics, impact tracking, the 14 innovators selected will begin the Accelerator Programme immediately, receiving tailormade mentoring, piloting guidance and industry expertise to help these technologies scale. “We’re excited to welcome Batch 8 of our Global Innovation Programme, a cohort of 14 trailblazing innovators. The world needs innovation to lead the vanguard on positive, long-term climate action and sustainability – the case for supporting innovative start-ups such as these who are driving the change, is looking stronger than ever!" says Katrin Ley, Managing Director, Fashion for Good.
Guided and advised by the Fashion for Good team, the 14 innovators will be able to tap into the knowledge and expertise of Fashion for Good’s roster of 20 global partners of brands and manufacturers. Having extended the length of the programme to nine months last year, the additional time with the innovators has proven helpful in giving them structured support in pilot development as well as deeper coaching sessions, better preparing them to further grow their technologies once graduating. Over the nine month programme, Fashion for Good and their partners will provide impact assessments and market validation to map a path to scale for the innovator’s solutions.
This new batch encompasess solutions for various impact hot spots, ranging from raw materials, end-of-use, digital acceleration, plastics, impact tracking and solutions that enable the shift from wet to dry processing in the pretreatment, dyeing and finishing stages. Also, this batch of innovators represent the highest number of female led start-ups selected thus far with 6 of the innovators founded or co-founded by women.
The selected innovators of the eighth batch are: Alchemie, AnamXR, Biophilica, eCO2Dye, Lignopure, Living Ink, Made2Flow, MTI-X, OSM-Shield, Perfitly, Rescoll, Stony Creek Colors, The Hurd Co., and Traceless.
Among them, several are using biobased processes:
- UK-based Biophilica transforms garden and park waste into a leather alternative that is compostable, plastic-free, estimated carbon neutral, and recyclable as green waste or into new Treekind™ material.
- German Lignopure provides a platform technology developing a 100% plant-based leather alternative made from industrial side-stream lignin and natural rubber, making it a biobased and inherent biodegradable polymer. The multiple applications include apparel, furniture, automobile leather or polyurethane alternatives.
- US-based Living Ink is a biotechnology company transforming waste-algae material into a bio-based carbon black that can replace petroleum derived carbon black. The pigment is jet black, UV stable and has the potential to be carbon negative. Living Ink has integrated the pigments into a variety of ink formulations and has tested the pigment in a variety of other materials ranging from plastics to polyurethane foams.
- US-based Stony Creek Colors creates a plant-based indigo that can replace petrochemical based synthetic indigo dyes. They optimise indigo production in a (non-GMO) closed loop process which has the potential to be carbon negative. In addition, they are working with small-scale farmers and helping them to switch from tobacco to indigo which can provide them with a more stable income stream and keep prime farmland in agricultural production.
- The Hurd Co. from US engineers fibre pulp made from 100% agricultural waste feedstock to be converted into viscose alternatives. The zero waste Agrilose™ process uses less water and significantly less energy than conventional man-made cellulosic fibres.
- German company traceless materials develop home compostable films, rigid materials and coatings that are 100% bio-based, derived from agricultural residues and are competitive in price and quality. Because they fully degrade in the environment, products made from traceless materials can substitute plastics in many products that potentially end up in the environment, and thus contribute to solving global plastic pollution.