INTERVIEW WITH RECYCLING FABRIK

Recycling Fabrik recycles plastic waste from the 3D printing sector into new filament and granulate. The company has developed a cycle for 3D printing plastics. They collect prototypes, misprints and support structures and produce 100% recycled filament from them.

Recycling Fabrik is a young start-up from Braunschweig, Germany and founded Recycling Fabrik in April 2021. Since their foundation the company has grown from 60sqm to now 1.500sqm and the team now consists of 10 people.

Interview with Jonas Kieserling, CTO at Recycling Fabrik.

Easy Engineering: A brief description of the company and its activities.

Jonas Kieserling: The special thing about us: We do everything ourselves and everything under one roof in beautiful Lower Saxony in Germany. What’s also special is that you collect points for the material you send us, which can be redeemed as a discount in our online store.

Easy Engineering: What are the main areas of activity of the company?

J.K: The focus of our company is to collect valuable plastics before they are mixed with other plastics and to create a product from this raw material. So we focus on recycling on the same level, it is not downcycling. Our core competence is to establish a circular economy for the thermoplastics used in 3D printing and to be able to carry out all the necessary process steps ourselves.

E.E: What’s the news about new products?

J.K: With our cycle, we can produce 100% recycled filament. And this completely from materials that otherwise would have ended up in the worst and unfortunately also most common case in the incineration. Many other companies also produce recycled filament, but often from their own production waste. This is also urgently needed, but no one before us has taken care of saving the printed materials. That’s what makes us unique.

E.E: What are the ranges of products? What are the most innovative products marketed?

J.K: At the moment, we have the 3D printing plastic PLA on offer for the end user, but we are already working at full speed on other plastics. For companies, other materials are already possible. This can be easily requested on our website.

E.E: At what stage is the market where you are currently active?

J.K: 3D printing itself is still relatively young, recycling has not really found its way into the industry yet. We also noticed this at Formnext 2022. In addition to many great innovations, we were the only ones there who cared about the end of life of materials.

E.E: What can you tell us about market trends?

J.K: We see that sustainability in general and now also sustainable filament are in high demand. And the development continues. We get many requests every day from all over Europe and beyond, with ideas for recycling projects and recycling on demand. Recycling must become a central point of 3D printing, as the conscious use of resources is essential.

E.E: What estimations do you have for 2023?

J.K: We are very much looking forward to the year 2023, as we will be adding many new products and materials to our portfolio and have already planned some exciting projects with great cooperation partners. You can always stay up to date via our website and social media channels.