British biomaterials developer Ponda seeks fresh backing to scale plant-based insulation for fashion

Apr 30, 2026 - 02:00

Bristol-based Ponda, a biomaterials company bringing plant-based insulation to fashion, has launched a new crowdfunding campaign on the platform Republic in order to scale their BioPuff product – made from wetland-grown bulrush.

The company announced a €2 million Seed round in November, as covered by EU-Startups, and are aiming to raise at least €230k (£200k), with no cap. Total funding to date stands at €5.6 million ($6.6 million), including grants and awards. The crowdfunding campaign is intended to support manufacturing scale-up, operational build-out and go-to-market execution as Ponda moves from early traction towards broader commercial supply.

Julian Ellis-Brown, Co-founder and CEO of Ponda, says “Fashion has spent years talking about the need for better materials, but the real test is whether those materials can work in products, in supply chains and at meaningful scale. That is what we are building with BioPuff, not just a new insulation, but a system that connects product performance with wetland regeneration.”

Several funding announcements throughout the year focused on biomaterials, textile materials and adjacent circular-materials sectors give context to the ecosystem that Ponda is currently innovating in.

UK: Sparxell raised €4.2 million in pre-Series A funding to scale its plant-based colour technology for fashion and textiles; Bath-based Naturbeads received €4.1 million in EU funding to produce biodegradable cellulose-based microbeads, another same-country example; London’s Epoch Biodesign raised €10.3 million to support nylon 6,6 biorecycling and a London facility for textile and industrial waste streams; Bristol-based Uplift360 secured €7.4 million to expand composite-waste recovery and reuse, making it a same-city adjacent advanced-materials comparator.
Copenhagen’s Octarine Bio added €5 million to its Series A to advance its sustainable colour platform, including textile-related applications.
Delft-based Foamlab raised €3 million to build a pilot plant and scale bacterial-cellulose foams for sectors including fashion, packaging, furniture and construction.
Switzerland’s Seprify secured €13.4 million to move its cellulose-based industrial ingredients platform towards procurement-ready supply.
Sweden’s PaperShell won up to €40.3 million to expand production of fossil-free composite materials through a new factory.

Taken together, these 2026 announcements represent over €87 million in funding across bio-based, cellulose-derived, circular and lower-carbon materials. Within this context, Ponda’s crowdfunding campaign sits alongside a wider European pattern of financing for material substitutes, production infrastructure and circular supply chains.

“Support from partners such as H&M Foundation and Parley for the Oceans has helped validate the wider relevance of what we are doing. As we move into the next stage of growth, the opportunity is to prove that regenerative material systems can be commercially viable, operationally credible and genuinely useful for brands.” adds Julian.

Founded in 2020, Ponda is a biomaterials company developing regenerative materials for the textile industry. Its first product, BioPuff, is a plant-based insulation made from fibres extracted from bulrush grown on restored wetlands through paludiculture.

By linking material production to wetland regeneration, Ponda’s model reportedly supports carbon reduction, biodiversity recovery, and the development of more responsible insulation materials.

According to the company, wetlands store more than twice the carbon of all the world’s trees combined, but once drained, they release 1.9 gigatonnes of CO2 a year, around twice fashion’s total emissions.

As brands face growing pressure to reduce reliance on fossil-based and animal-derived materials, Ponda is offering a different route: insulation made from bulrush (Typha), a wetland plant cultivated through paludiculture, farming on rewetted peatlands and other wet landscapes.

Peatlands may cover just 3% of the world’s land surface, but they store more carbon than all the world’s forests combined. When drained, they become a major source of emissions.

BioPuff turns wetland plants into a new kind of insulation for fashion and accessories, offering brands an alternative to fossil-based synthetic fills and conventional down.

Beatrice Oldenburg, Project Manager H&M Foundation, says: “When selecting Ponda as a winner of the Global Change Award, we were impressed by how they serve the textile industry with a self-healing raw material that can contribute to decarbonising the industry while also caring for the people within its system. This is exactly the type of early-stage changemaker the Global Change Award aims to support.”

As Ponda moves from pilot production and early brand engagement towards broader commercial scale, the company says that this investment crowdfunding campaign will allow the company to support the next stage of growth and wetland regeneration.

At the same time, BioPuff is being developed as a commercially relevant solution for a category that has remained heavily reliant on petroleum-based fills and virgin animal down.

BioPuff has been used by brands including Ahluwalia, Berghaus, Stella McCartney and Sheep Inc., with Stella McCartney featuring the material in the Falabella bag as part of the Autumn 2024 collection. Ponda is also part of Parley’s Future Material initiative, which brings together leading biomaterial innovators working to replace harmful industry standards.

Cyrill Gutsch, CEO & Founder, Parley for the Oceans, says: “True innovation is not just about new materials, but about redefining our relationship with the Earth. BioPuff points to a future where materials are grown within regenerative systems that puts focus on rebuilding soil, restoring ecosystems, and turning supply chains into forces for regeneration.”

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