Recycleye is a London-based startup that builds recycling-picking robots using machine learning and high-speed scanning to identify and sort materials. The company says its systems identify materials at an "unrivaled 60 frames per second" and sort them more accurately than humans. Recycleye claims its tech is twice as fast as the industry standard and that each item is seen on average 30 times as it passes along the conveyor belt, doubling the chance of accurate identification before picking. The startup positions its solution as a way to cut the cost of sorting materials and help address shortcomings in plastic recycling. TechCrunch reports Recycleye raised $17 million in a new Series A round led by Palo Alto–based DCVC, with participation from London’s Playfair Capital and other investors. Recycleye builds digital tools that combine advanced machine learning, computer vision and robotics to detect materials and provide analytics for waste-management operations. The technology aims to increase purity and traceability of recyclates, preventing downcycling and boosting the resale value of bales by up to fivefold. The company says its solutions can lower operational expenditure and save recycling facilities as much as £2M per year. With the fresh funding it plans to further enhance the accuracy of its technology and to grow its engineering and commercial teams. Recycleye also intends to expand into new European markets while consolidating its presence in the UK, France and Italy, and to broaden its product line beyond vision systems. Founded in 2019 by Victor Dewulf and Peter Hedley and based in London, the company has commercial traction in multiple territories. To date it has raised £4.7M, including the September 2021 £3.5M seed round. Recycleye develops a computer-vision system combined with robotics to detect and classify all items in waste streams by material, object and brand, enabling automated recovery of useful materials. The company aims to remove the need for manual waste pickers and focuses on affordable robotics. Founded one year ago, Recycleye has scaled from research to commercialisation with support from Microsoft’s AI for Good Programme. It has deployed multiple systems in France and secured paid pilots with two of the three largest waste-management players in the UK. The business is part of Tech Nation’s Applied AI accelerator and plans to expand to wider Europe next year. Financially, Recycleye has raised a £1.2 million seed round and received grants from InnovateUK and the European Union to fund development.

Total raised

$23M

Funding rounds

3

Latest round

Series A

Latest activity

Feb 2023