In another sign of the scramble to accelerate the uptake and transformative potential of artificial intelligence, Dutch recycling giant Bollegraaf Group is making a strategic investment in UK AI startup Greyparrot, which uses computer vision for waste analytics.The veteran manufacturer of MRFs (Material Recovery Facilities) and “turnkey” recycling systems — which was originally founded as a baler machinery maker, all the way back in 1961 — has been dabbling in AI itself in recent years, opening an innovation test center in its native Netherlands in 2021 and recruiting an in-house AI team to work on integrating AI analytics with its recycling machinery that had led to some commercial rollouts.London-based Greyparrot, meanwhile, a 2019-founded computer vision startup (and TC Disrupt battlefield alum), has spent nearly five years developing and applying AI to municipal waste management processes to produce what it bills as “waste intelligence” — aka, data on binned plastics and other tossed items. This is critical for improving the quality of the product for recyclers to sell. The tech can also be used to recover valuable (i.e. recyclable) materials from mixed/contaminated waste streams that might otherwise end up in landfill or be incinerated.The second big puzzle-piece in Greyparrot’s mission to apply AI to shrink the world’s waste problem through smarter and more efficient recycling is to move from being a data producer to a decision-maker — as the AI-engine driving sorting and recovering machinery to be more efficient. This too is critical as the world continues to produce more (not less) waste, dialling up the requirement for more intelligently managing the stuff we throw away so our societies don’t drown under a growing mountain of trash.Add to that, in Europe at least, the introduction across several recent years of a number of regulatory requirements on packaging and other producers to use more recycled materials in their products are increasing incentives — and stabilizing demand — for better quality recycled outputs to sell them.While the bulk of Greyparrot’s deployments so far have involved retrofitting its AI devices to existing recycling plants, it expects future waste recovery facilities to be built from scratch with AI embedded from the start — and it wants its tech (the Greyparrot Analyzer, as its AI camera hardware unit is called) to be the brain of those operations. So it’s working towards a thesis of rising automation of waste management — where AI-powered data-driven analytics get more and more deeply embedded in how recycling facilities operate as a result of rising demand to optimize recovery rates, yield better quality outputs and squeeze how much waste gets, well, wasted.Greyparrot has been building APIs (aka Greyparrot Sync) for integrating with its customers’ sorting and recovery facilities’ machinery for a while

The European Green Deal sets out the aim for Europe to reach net-zero by 2050 – which would make Europe the first climate-neutral continent. The European Green Deal also includes the Circular Economy Action Plan. Transitioning Europe towards a circular economy will reduce pressure on natural resources and create sustainable economic growth and jobs. Europe is a global leader in the circular economy policy. The European government has influenced changes in the law to support a shift to a circular economy with policies like banning single-use plastics, settings targets for reuse and recycling, and obligations for separate collection of textiles and biowaste

Greyparrot, a London, UK-based AI powered waste management software company, raised $11 million in Series A funding. The round was led by Una Terra with participation from with Closed Loop Partners, Speedinvest, Unreasonable Collective, 360 Capital, Archipelago Eco Investors, Accelerating Growth Fund, and TI Capital. The company, which has raised a total of $15.9 million, intends to use the funds to increase [] The post Greyparrot Raises £8.9M in Series A Funding appeared first on FinSMEs.