Innovation environment for sustainable production and circular flows

Wargön Innovation, together with Science Park Borås, has been granted SEK 30 million from the European Regional Development Fund for a three-year initiative to support small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the transition to circular business models and increased resource efficiency. The aim is to contribute to increased competitiveness for SMEs and green transition in West Sweden, but also to develop a world-leading test and development environment for industrial sorting and valuation of textile materials.

Over the next three years, Wargön Innovation and Science Park Borås will deepen their efforts to support SMEs in scaling up or developing their circular business models and provide support to take material innovations from idea to industrial scale, including with the help of automation. By promoting companies' ideas for new innovative materials and products, their competitiveness is strengthened in a new market with demands for sustainability and circularity.

The project focuses on two main activities;

1. a test and demo environment for industrial sorting and valuation of textile products and comparable consumer goods. Automation of work is crucial to enable cost-efficiency and scalability in circular value chains.
2. support SMEs in the development and pilot production of circular and/or bio-based products or services. The aim is to find solutions to technical and business challenges in order to take an innovation from idea to commercialization.

During the project period, at least 60 SMEs will be supported in the development of sustainable and innovative materials and products that are both adapted to circularity and scalable for industrialization.

The goal is also to have developed and made available by 2026 a leading test and development environment for industrial sorting and valuation of materials and products in circular cycles, thereby enabling the establishment of large-scale facilities that create new opportunities for circular system solutions and the development of business models that open up completely new markets.