EcoBean

Cover Block

Field	Value
Name	EcoBean
Tagline	Turns coffee waste into sustainable chemicals and materials to reduce emissions and create revenue streams.
Headquarters	Warsaw, Poland
Founded	2017
Stage	Seed
Business Model	B2B
Industry	Cleantech / Climatetech
Geography	Eastern Europe
Growth Profile	Venture Scale
Funding Label	Seed
Total Disclosed	~$2.18M [Tracxn]

Links

• Website: https://ecobean.pl/
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/eco-bean/

What an Investor Needs First

EcoBean is a Warsaw-based deep-tech startup that processes spent coffee grounds into a portfolio of specialty chemicals and materials, addressing a waste stream that totals millions of tonnes globally each year [EIT Food]. Founded in 2017 as a spinout from Warsaw University of Technology, the company has built a patented process that fractionates used grounds into coffee oil, antioxidants, lactic acid, protein-rich additives, and coffee lignin for downstream use in cosmetics, pharma, food, feed, and packaging [EIT Food] [Crunchbase]. The founding team is led by Kacper Kossowski-Gerlach and Marcin Kozior and Marcin Koziorowski [LinkedIn]. EcoBean has raised approximately $2.18M in seed funding led by CofounderZone, with participation from EIT InnoEnergy, CIECH Ventures, and COBIN Angels, and is a MassChallenge Switzerland alumnus [AIN, December 2022] [EIT InnoEnergy]. The business model targets industrial off-takers in chemicals and consumer goods. Over the next 12 to 18 months, the items most worth tracking are commercial off-take agreements with named industrial partners, throughput at any pilot or first-of-kind facility, and whether a Series A round materializes from the existing strategic syndicate or from a new lead. The cited "up to 50% lower carbon footprint on average" claim for its outputs [EIT Food] is the kind of metric a buyer or a Series A lead will want third-party verified.

Data Accuracy: GREEN -- Confirmed by Crunchbase, Tracxn, EIT Food, and AIN.

Taxonomy Snapshot

Axis	Value
Stage	Seed
Business Model	B2B
Industry / Vertical	Cleantech / Climatetech (circular bioeconomy)
Geography	Eastern Europe (Poland)
Growth Profile	Venture Scale
Funding	~$2.18M seed, lead CofounderZone

Inside the Company

EcoBean was founded in 2017 in Warsaw as a technology spinout from Warsaw University of Technology, with a stated mission to extend the coffee value chain by routing spent grounds away from landfill and into industrial chemistry [LinkedIn] [CIC]. The company is based out of CIC Warsaw [CIC]. The core founding pair is Kacper Kossowski-Gerlach and Marcin Koziorowski [LinkedIn]. In late 2022, EcoBean closed a seed round of approximately €2.1M (about $2.18M) led by CofounderZone, with EIT InnoEnergy, CIECH Ventures, and COBIN Angels participating [AIN, December 2022] [EIT InnoEnergy] [MarketScreener].

Data Accuracy: GREEN -- Confirmed by Crunchbase, LinkedIn, PitchBook, and AIN.

Under the Hood

EcoBean's product is a fractionation process that takes spent coffee grounds (SCG) as feedstock and outputs five distinct chemical fractions: coffee oil, antioxidants, lactic acid, protein-rich additives, and coffee lignin [EIT Food]. These outputs are pitched into cosmetics, pharmaceutical, food, animal feed, and packaging end-markets [EIT Food]. Crunchbase describes the underlying IP as a "proprietary technology" for converting waste coffee grounds into raw materials and specialty chemicals, and EIT Food specifically uses the word "patented" [Crunchbase] [EIT Food]. The headline sustainability claim attached to the output portfolio is an average carbon footprint up to 50% lower than incumbent equivalents [EIT Food].

Data Accuracy: YELLOW -- Product claims are corroborated by EIT Food and Crunchbase, but throughput, yield, and unit-economics data are not publicly available.

Market Research and Opportunity

Spent coffee grounds are one of the largest underutilized organic waste streams in the consumer economy, and EU regulation is steadily pricing landfill and incineration out of the option set for food-industry waste. EIT Food frames the feedstock pool as "millions of tonnes" of coffee grounds entering landfill annually [EIT Food]. EcoBean's addressable market is a stack of specialty-chemical sub-segments. Coffee oil competes into cosmetics actives and nutraceutical ingredients; antioxidants compete into food preservation and personal care; lactic acid is a building block for bioplastics and food acidulants; protein-rich additives target animal feed; and coffee lignin is a candidate for bio-based binders and packaging materials [EIT Food]. The presence of CIECH Ventures, the corporate venture arm of a publicly listed European chemicals producer, in the cap table is a market signal [MarketScreener] [EIT InnoEnergy].

Data Accuracy: YELLOW -- Demand framing is corroborated by EIT Food and EIT InnoEnergy, but no named third-party TAM report is in the captured source set.

Competition and Substitutes

EcoBean is positioned as a multi-output biorefinery for a single waste feedstock. Tracxn's database flags 3,676 active competitors in the broader waste-to-value cleantech category, of which 153 are funded and 143 have exited [Tracxn]. EcoBean's five-fraction approach is broader than any single-output competitor. Where EcoBean has a defensible edge today is the combination of a patent estate around the fractionation process [EIT Food], a strategic chemicals investor in CIECH Ventures [MarketScreener], and the EIT InnoEnergy stamp [EIT InnoEnergy].

Data Accuracy: YELLOW -- Category-size data from Tracxn; no named competitors in the captured source set.

Opportunity

If EcoBean executes, the prize is becoming the default European biorefinery for spent coffee grounds, with a multi-product chemicals catalogue sold into regulated buyers that are actively substituting petrochemical inputs. The cited evidence that makes this reachable is a feedstock pool measured in millions of tonnes per year [EIT Food], a strategic chemicals investor already on the cap table [MarketScreener] [EIT InnoEnergy], and an output carbon-footprint differential cited at up to 50% lower on average [EIT Food].

Scenario	What happens	Catalyst	Why it's plausible
Strategic off-take with CIECH	A multi-year supply agreement for one fraction into CIECH's chemicals distribution	CIECH Ventures converts its seed position into a commercial agreement	CIECH Ventures is already an investor [MarketScreener]
EU green-industry scale grant	Non-dilutive scale-up funding via EIT InnoEnergy or Horizon Europe pulls a first-of-kind plant forward	A successful pilot triggers grant-backed capex	EIT InnoEnergy is an existing investor and grant gateway [EIT InnoEnergy]
Cosmetics flagship brand win	A named European personal-care brand adopts coffee oil or antioxidants as a low-carbon input	Brand sustainability reporting cycle forces ingredient substitution	EIT Food cites cosmetics as a target end-market [EIT Food]

Data Accuracy: YELLOW -- Scenarios anchored in cited investor relationships and end-market framing; no named off-take customer or revenue figure is on the public record.

Sources

1. [LinkedIn] EcoBean company page | https://www.linkedin.com/company/eco-bean/
2. [EIT Food] EcoBean: turning coffee waste into valuable chemicals | https://www.eitfood.eu/impact-stories/ecobean-turning-coffee-waste-into-valuable-chemicals
3. [Tracxn] EcoBean 2025 Company Profile, Funding, Competitors & Financials | https://tracxn.com/d/companies/ecobean/__YkScgNPhJMTFnuO9VGOc5awcvQLLSXbYKHcpepH8TB0
4. [PitchBook] EcoBean 2025 Company Profile: Valuation, Funding & Investors | https://pitchbook.com/profiles/company/459222-31
5. [CIC] EcoBean's Impact through Innovation at CIC Warsaw | https://cic.com/blog/ecobeans-impact-through-innovation-at-cic-warsaw/
6. [Impakter] How Startup EcoBean Recycles Coffee Grounds | https://impakter.com/startup-is-recycling-used-coffee-grounds-to-battle-climate-change/
7. [Crunchbase] Ecobean Company Profile & Funding | https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/ecobean
8. [Crunchbase] Seed Round - Ecobean | https://www.crunchbase.com/funding_round/ecobean-seed--ea3be6a0
9. [LinkedIn] Kacper Kossowski-Gerlach - EcoBean Co-Founder | https://pl.linkedin.com/in/kkossowski
10. [CofounderZone] Ecobean secures funding to advance on the path to limit the carbon footprint of the global coffee industry | https://cofounder.zone/blog/37-ecobean-secures-funding-to-advance-on-the-path-to-limit-the-carbon-footprint-of-the-global-coffee-industry
11. [AIN, December 2022] Polish startup Ecobean raises over €2.1M in seed funding | https://en.ain.ua/2022/12/01/ecobean-raises-over-2-1m/
12. [MarketScreener] Ciech S A: Ecobean secures funding to limit the carbon footprint of the global coffee industry | https://www.marketscreener.com/quote/stock/CIECH-S-A-6497690/news/Ciech-S-A-Ecobean-secures-funding-to-advance-on-the-path-to-limit-the-carbon-footprint-of-the-global-coffee-industry-42427425/
13. [EIT InnoEnergy] Ecobean secures funding to advance on the path to limit the carbon footprint of the global coffee industry | https://innoenergy.com/news-resources/ecobean-secures-funding-to-advance-on-the-path-to-limit-the-carbon-footprint-of-the-global-coffee-industry/
14. [EcoBean] Home - EcoBean coffee waste reinvented | https://ecobean.pl/