Winning words

Green Alley Award startup update: PulpaTronics

Three months ago, the Green Alley Award convened in Berlin to mark its 10th anniversary and highlight six exceptional startups committed to circular economy innovations.

Since then, these startups have made impressive progress. The Green Alley Award team recently interviewed them to learn more about their progress and journey since the award.

In a recent interview with PulpaTronics, this year’s winner, CEO Chloe So reflected on the award’s impact:

Sustainability stamp of approval

“We are so honoured to have been awarded this prize. With this sustainability stamp of approval, we think this award will help us build brand trust and open doors to more industry connections. This award has already led to a few inbound requests for more information and potential collaborations.”

When asked about new partnerships, Chloe noted:

“We have initiated a few partnerships since winning the award, but they are currently too early of a stage to be disclosed. However, in addition to retail partnerships, we’ve also been trying to explore other applications our technology could work with.”

New possibilities

PulpaTronics strongly believes in the power of partnerships and collaborations:

“Working with partners opens up new possibilities for where our technology could disrupt. As a small startup, accessing state of the art resources can be challenging, so by partnering up with bigger companies, you are able to leverage some of their resources and industry expertise to accelerate progress quicker. In any collaboration, you also never know what new ideas or inventions could arise. Lastly, a partnership can also help you scale and distribute your product more easily, so this can definitely help startups grow and gain market share faster.”

Focus on the future

Looking ahead, PulpaTronics has significant growth and strategic plans in the pipeline:

“The crucial next step for our company is doubling down on our tag R&D, specifically looking at durability testing, and producing small batch quantities to fulfil our pilots lined up for next year. We are about to close our pre-seed fundraise, so with the amount, we’ll build out our first small pilot production line to automate our processes. We hope to launch our trials in the first half of 2025!”

When asked about how PulpaTronics intends to invest the €25,000 Green Alley Award money, Chloe offered some insights:

“We look to use the award to continue to bolster our sustainability credentials. We’re currently B Corp pending, so spending some of the money to carry out a full life-cycle analysis will be key to ensuring that our business is running the most sustainably it can be. We will also use the money for IP purposes as we look to expand our pending patents into international ones too.”

The Green Alley Award has already begun to open new doors for PulpaTronics, and we look forward to seeing their continued success and innovation in the circular economy.

To hear more about the exciting developments from the other finalists, check out the Green Alley Award website for their interviews and stay updated on their journeys.