Fashion for Good chooses 14 start-ups for their Accelerator Program

Fashion for Good, the platform for sustainable fashion innovation has gotten the 14 start-ups recently selected for its Accelerator Program. The section of the companies was done from among 22 entrepreneurial companies during Fashion for Good’s virtual selection day.

The new group of startups offers various solutions ranging from raw materials, processing, digital acceleration, plastics, end-of-use, and impact tracking, and solutions that enable the shift from wet to dry processing in the pretreatment, dyeing, and finishing stages of garment production.

The 9-month program is designed to facilitate financing, provide impact assessments and introduce startups to potential collaborators, technical mentors, and other industry leaders in its eighth cycle. The Amsterdam-based organization will straight away begin to anticipate the companies with industry expertise and mentoring guidance to help their technologies scale. All the start-ups will be able to gain insights and information from the 20 global brands that are partners with Fashion for Good.

The selected start-ups also include the highest number of female-led startups selected, with 6 having been founded or co-founded by women.

Fashion for Good’s managing director, Katrin Ley said that to lead the vanguard on positive, long-term climate action and sustainability, the world needs innovation. The opportunity for innovative start-ups like these who are driving the change is looking stronger than ever.

U.S.-based natural indigo maker Stony Creek Colors recently announced it raised $9 million. In addition to Stony Creek Colors, which is partnering with farmers, mills, and brands to develop consistent bio-based dyes other U.S-based dyes and finishing startups in the program include Eco2Dye, a company that specializes in waterless textile dyeing technology; OSM Shield, which creates environmentally safe high-performance fabric finishes and Living Ink, a biotechnology company that transforms waste-algae material into a bio-based carbon black that can replace its petroleum-based counterpart.

Fashion for Good also selected The Hurd Co., the U.S.-based engineers who specialize in making fabric from agricultural waste with agrilose, a sustainable fiber feedstock pulp. U.S.-based tech firms AnamXR, a company that builds virtual immersive B2B platforms and DTC gamified retail experiences; and AR/VR-AI to create a size recommendation platform for e-commerce, are part of the accelerator as well.

The UK-based firm Alchemie who has developed clean dyeing and finishing processes along with MTI-X Ltd., a company that digitally pretreats and finishes natural and synthetic textile materials have also joined the program. Alchemie’s process is currently focused on polyester and is enabled by a “digital fluid jetting technology,”. They will soon be available for natural fibers such as cotton.

France-based startup Rescoll that offers a thermal-debondable separation technique for different applications in the fashion industry, along with enabling further reuse and recycling of material components is also a part of the program.

From Germany there is Made2Flow, a company that uses machine learning-based solutions to gather data directly from production partners and validate it based on multiple sources; along with Traceless, creators of a compostable plastic substitute.

Fashion for Good is also extending its support behind 2 startups based on leather alternatives. Germany-based Lignopure provides a platform technology developing a 100% plant-based leather alternative made from industrial side-stream lignin and natural rubber; while U.K.-based Biophilica transforms garden and park waste into a compostable, plastic-free leather alternative.