Renewcell has a buyer, if only for its pilot facility.
Biosorbe, a Swedish company that makes a bio-based oil-spill-absorbing product, revealed Tuesday that it has snapped up the bankrupt textile recycler’s demo premises in Kristinehamn, a nearly seven-hour-drive south from Renewcell’s commercial-scale plant in Sundsvall.
Renewcell opened the 2,000-square-meter location in 2018, transforming thousands of metric tons of castoff clothing into the dissolving pulp known as Circulose, before setting its eyes on the site of a former paper mill to expand its capacity by orders of magnitude a couple of years later. The Sundsvall factory, optimistically named Renewcell 1 because it was meant to be the first in a series of similar setups that would power deforestation-free man-made cellulosic production worldwide, is still up for grabs, as are Renewcell’s patents and technology.
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Bankruptcy administrator Lars-Henrik Andersson’s last update was at the end of March, when he confirmed that Renewcell has received “multiple” bids for its business and assets. A final closing, he said at the time, was expected in mid-April. The next piece of news came from forestry nonprofit and “next-gen” innovation champion Canopy, which posted a note on LinkedIn on Monday saying that “multiple bidders are still in due diligence, and as we all know, that takes time.” Meanwhile, it said, brands, producers and suppliers are experiencing “great success” with integrating Circulose into their product lines, Faherty and Reformation being among the more recent ones.
Biosorbe’s product resembles balls of fluff—very different from Circulose, which is produced in stiff cardboard-like sheets. Still, the Kristinehamn factory is “suitable for its purposes” and will help it scale up its production, the company said. Production in the space is expected to commence this month.
“Right now we are in the process of moving into the premises and preparing for the start of production,” said Kajsa Fougner, CEO of Biosorbe. “The acquisition of the Kristinehamn factory will also mean that Biosorbe’s headquarters will move from Karlstad to Kristinehamn in the near future, as part of the ongoing development. Biosorbe is developing on many levels.”
