Metycle raises funds for trading platform

Cologne, Germany based recycling-focused website Metycle says it has raised 1.5 million euros ($1.6 million) in a “preseed financing round” to help it “digitalize global metal recycling.”

Metycle says it has created a platform for international scrap metal trading that “aims to make the market more efficient and support the transition toward a carbon-neutral world.”

The firm says investors in the new financing round include venture capital firms Poland-based Market One Capital and the Netherlands-based Dutch Founders Fund (DFF). Metycle describes Tom Bird, a recycling veteran and long-time Bureau of International Recycling (BIR) officer, and Louis Pfitzner, a Berlin-based entrepreneur and investor, as “angel investors."

“Metycle further simplifies international trade of vital secondary raw materials, ensuring a truly global circular economy,” Bird says. “Scrap metals are by far the most recycled materials, helping to reduce the CO₂ footprint of the metal industry and easing the need for further primary raw materials. This only works if the recycled metals can be traded globally.”

Rafael Suchan, co-founder and managing director of Metycle, says, “Our new venture further accelerates international trade of secondary metals by ensuring product quality combined with fast and seamless product ordering and shipment. We bring trust via a digital sales channel into a vastly fragmented global industry.”

Suchan co-founder Sebastian Brenner adds, “For suppliers, Metycle takes the pain of negotiating, monitoring payment and logistics flows. For buyers, we give access to prime quality material, payment options in local currency and at payment terms.”

Suchan has prior recycling sector experience as a former executive with Hong Kong-based Chiho Environmental Group and its Scholz Recycling business unit. Metycle describes Brenner as having a proven track record in building and scaling business-to-business (B2B) marketplaces.

“We’re excited to partner with Sebastian and Rafael on their mission towards more efficient and sustainable trading of metals for recycling,” says Jacek Łubiński, a partner at Market One Capital. “Given their experience and expertise, the founders are uniquely positioned to make it happen. It’s a huge market and Metycle fits very well into our B2B marketplaces investment focus.”

“Sebastian and Rafael know the market for secondary metals like no other,” says Mart de Haar, a partner at DFF. “Powered by their deep domain expertise, they have built a marketplace that caters to the needs of buyers and sellers alike – creating transparency and efficiency across the entire value chain. Through its global marketplace and international matchmaking, the lifetime value of scrap metal is greatly extended – a fantastic win-win-win situation,“.

Metycle describes the global market for scrap metals as being larger than $600 billion annually. “Metals play a crucial role in infrastructure investments and in the transition towards a green economy,” the company adds. “While it is collected in all parts of the industrialized world, nowadays approximately 70 percent of global metal smelting capacities are located in Asia,” Metycle says, referring to the global nature of the sector.