"By providing a viable, local alternative to conventional palm oil, Colipi is paving the way for a more sustainable and environmentally conscious future," said Dr Melanie Leonhard, Senator for Economics and Innovation. Beyourpilot had helped the start-up secure the grant. "That illustrates the importance of support services for early phase start-ups," she noted. Beyourpilot, Hamburg's largest universities and the research center DESY have joined forces to boost start-ups. Jonas Heuer, Maximilian Webers, CEO, Philipp Arbter and Tyll Utesch, founded Colipi in March 2022 as a spin-off from the Technical University of Hamburg (TUHH) and had availed of the start-up service. "The EXIST funding scheme is unique and distinguishes Germany as a business centre," said Webers.
The Hamburg-based Colipi start-up has secured EUR 4.1 million in an EXIST grant from the German Ministry of Economics and Climate Protection (BMWK) to develop a sustainable alternative to palm oil. The grant is being increased from EUR 2.9 million to EUR 4.1 million to bring the start-up's technology to market maturity swiftly.
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Climate Oil for cosmetics, food, bio-plastics and e-fuels
Colipi's "globally unique Carbon Capture & Utilization (CCU) approach" is based on a patented gas fermentation system of microorganisms using carbon dioxide, oxygen and hydrogen as feedstocks and was developed in-house. "Based on the initial results and calculations, we hope to convert carbon dioxide into palm oil alternatives using hydrogen in an economically and ecologically sensible way in a few years," said Webers. The Colipi Climate Oil could then be used, e.g, as a raw material in cosmetics, food, bio-plastics and e-fuels thereby reducing the carbon footprint of the products.
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