Laval, QC-based cleantech startup Dispersa, which has developed a process for turning food waste into affordable and sustainable chemicals for everyday products, has secured $5.8 million CAD in seed funding from Canadian investors to commercialize its flagship ingredient.
Dispersa claims its PuraSurf biosurfactant can be used to replace conventional fossil-fuel and palm-derived surfactants in all-purpose cleaners, detergents, and hand soaps.
Dispersa plans to use its seed capital to boost production of PuraSurf to commercial volumes and fulfill its growing pipeline of customer purchase orders as it looks to sell the ingredient to manufacturers in the North American cleaning products market. The company intends to more than double its 12-person team and hire at least 14 people across manufacturing, sales, and operations.
Dispersa’s fermentation process is “similar to brewing beer in stainless steel reactors.”
“As Dispersa is our nation’s sole biosurfactant manufacturer, we are grateful to be backed by an all-Canadian group of investors who believe in our mission, especially at a time when local manufacturing and creating resiliency in supply chain has become more critical than ever,” Dispersa founder and CEO Nivatha Balendra told BetaKit.
Dispersa’s all-equity, all-primary seed round, which closed this month, was financed entirely by Canadian investors. Halifax-based Nàdarra Ventures led, with support from fellow new investors the Business Development Bank of Canada’s Thrive Lab, Montréal’s Cycle Momentum, Calgary-based The51’s Food and AgTech Fund and Québec government-backed Fonds d’investissement Eurêka (via Hidden Layers Capital).
Existing backers like Toronto-based Good & Well and Dragonfly Ventures, and Montréal’s BoxOne Ventures and Front Row Ventures also participated in the startup’s seed financing, which brings Dispersa’s total funding to over $13 million CAD. Balendra declined to disclose the company’s valuation.
The CEO’s interest in biosurfactants dates back to a school science fair project, when she learned how some microbes could produce a natural alternative to one of the most widely used ingredients in the chemical industry. Balendra was further motivated to make sustainable and safe ingredients more accessible given her experience as a cancer survivor.
Surfactants are the active ingredients in many everyday products, including surface cleaners, laundry detergents, shampoos, and cosmetics. Over 90 percent of surfactants are derived from palm or petroleum, according to chemical industry trade publication CHEManager.
Founded in 2019, Dispersa’s innovation is its proprietary fermentation process for converting food waste into biosurfactants, which Balendra said is “similar to brewing beer in stainless steel reactors, but more complex.”
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The startup feeds its microbes in reactors with food waste—specifically waste oils and sugars—and then those microbes digest that waste and naturally produce and expel the biosurfactants in the reactor, “forming a mixture similar to soupy broth.” Dispersa separates those biosurfactants from this broth to create its final, microbe-free ingredients, which it claims are affordable, sustainable, and high-performing.
Dispersa currently operates from two locations: its headquarters in Laval, Québec, where the startup recently moved into a new 5,000 sq. ft facility to support research and product development, and Nova Scotia, where it partners with the Verschuren Centre to produce its biosurfactants and plans to move into large-scale commercial manufacturing.
Balendra noted that product manufacturers globally are facing pressure today to shift away from conventional surfactants in light of increased regulatory and consumer demands.
She argued that the looming threat of tariffs has also highlighted the need to strengthen local supply chains and manufacturing within Canada. “In our case, this means boosting biomanufacturing capacity and investing in infrastructure to ensure that we have the instruments to not only innovate but also to scale production within our nation,” she added, noting that this funding will help Dispersa do that.
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The company has moved from lab scale to commercial production in just two years, an evolution that Good & Well president and managing director Alexandra Baillie described as “remarkable” in a statement. Baillie is joining Dispersa’s newly formed board alongside Nàdarra Ventures general partner Mary Dimou.
“Circularity is central to Nàdarra’s thesis—revolutionizing the way we produce and use materials derived from nature,” Dimou said in a statement. “Dispersa’s advanced technology is a prime example of this, offering a breakthrough in surfactants at a time when regulatory shifts are demanding more sustainable solutions.”
Dispersa’s vision is to develop a selection of waste-derived biosurfactants for the industrial cleaning products industry as well as adjacent markets like home care and personal care.
“PuraSurf is the first of many biosurfactants to come and we look forward to scaling our library of novel biosurfactants tuned for diverse applications,” Balendra said.
Feature image courtesy Dispersa.