L'Oréal invests in biotech through a minority stake in Carbios
Clichy, 26 June 2019 - L'Oréal has participated in the capital increase conducted by Carbios, a company pioneering new, bio-industrial solutions to reinvent the lifecycle of plastic and textile polymers.
This participation was done through L'Oréal's corporate venture capital fund BOLD Business Opportunities for L'Oréal Development, launched in December 2018. With this operation Carbios will finance, amongst other elements, the industrial demonstrator for the biorecycling of plastics and polyester fibers in PET plastic, a first step towards industrializing the technology it has designed.
Carbios has developed a unique and sustainable technology using highly specific enzymes that can recycle much broader PET plastics and polyester fibers feedstock than other recycling technologies. This innovative process creates recycled PET equivalent to virgin PET, that can be used for applications like bottles and other forms of packaging.
Barbara Lavernos, Executive Vice-President Operations of L'Oréal, said « This participation demonstrates our support of new sustainable development technologies, in line with our commitment that by 2025, 100% of our packaging will be recycled, recyclable or compostable, and more specifically, 50% of the plastic used in our packaging will be recycled or bio-sourced. Carbios is developing a pioneering plastic recycling technology, based on both circular economy principles and biotechnologies, and we are proud to support them in their development. »
In 2017, Carbios and L'Oréal founded a Consortium to bring enhanced recycling technology to market on an industrial scale. Nestlé Waters, PepsiCo and Suntory Beverage & Food Europe recently joined the Consortium to help support the circular plastics economy using Carbios' breakthrough enzyme-based enhanced recycling technology.
BOLD Business Opportunities for L'Oréal Development is a corporate venture capital fund aiming to take minority stakes in innovative companies and brands with high growth potential. The fund invests in new business models in marketing, R&I, digital, retail, communication, supply chain and packaging and provides startups with L'Oréal's expertise, networking and mentorship.
L'Oréal has devoted itself to beauty for over 100 years. With its unique international portfolio of 36 diverse and complementary brands, the Group generated sales amounting to 26.9 billion euros in 2018 and employs 86,000 people worldwide. As the world's leading beauty company, L'Oréal is present across all distribution networks: mass market, department stores, pharmacies and drugstores, hair salons, travel retail, branded retail and e-commerce.
Research and innovation, and a dedicated research team of 3,993 people, are at the core of L'Oréal's strategy, working to meet beauty aspirations all over the world. L'Oréal's sustainability commitment for 2020 "Sharing Beauty With All" sets out ambitious sustainable development objectives across the Group's value chain.
For more information: http://mediaroom.loreal.com/en/
This news release may contain some forward-looking statements. Although the Company considers that these statements are based on reasonable hypotheses at the date of publication of this release, they are by their nature subject to risks and uncertainties which could cause actual results to differ materially from those indicated or projected in these statements."
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