1. What the Company Does

Recyclekaro is an urban-mining company: instead of digging metals out of the ground, it recovers them from discarded electronics and dead batteries. It runs end-to-end recovery of critical minerals from two main waste streams — electronic waste (e-waste) and end-of-life lithium-ion batteries — and sells the recovered metals back into industry. The company positions itself not as a plain waste-processor but as a material-recovery enterprise moving up the value chain toward high-purity, battery-grade outputs.

2. Business Model & How It Earns Revenue

Recyclekaro’s model has two economic engines: it gets paid to take waste, and it gets paid again for the materials it pulls out of that waste. In effect, its feedstock can be low-cost (or even revenue-generating on the collection side), while its outputs are high-value metals — the spread between the two is the business.

Revenue streams:

●        Sale of recovered metals (primary): cobalt, nickel, lithium (as lithium carbonate), manganese sulphate, copper, aluminium, and precious/rare-earth metals (gold, silver, platinum, palladium, neodymium). Most recovered material is currently sold to domestic chemical and industrial buyers, with the company working toward battery-grade outputs to sell directly to cell manufacturers.

●        Black mass: the intermediate cathode-material powder is itself a valuable, tradable feedstock for battery makers.

●        Recycling & EPR services: fees for managed e-waste/battery collection and recycling, plus issuance of Certificates of Recycling and EPR certificates that corporates use for ESG reporting, CPCB audits and EPR-target fulfilment.

●        Value-added / refined products: e.g., aluminium sheets made from scrap (via a pyrometallurgy line) sold back to utensil manufacturers, and a compost line from an earlier waste-collection business.

Strategic thesis in one line: Recyclekaro is trying to become a domestic supplier of critical minerals for India’s clean-energy supply chain, reducing dependence on imports from China — turning “urban waste” into a strategic raw-material source.

3. Key customers & partners

Battery/auto & energy names cited include Bajaj Auto, Tata Motors, Ather Energy and Hero MotoCorp. On the e-waste/enterprise side, clients include Capgemini, Accenture, Union Bank of India, Bank of Baroda, Tata Communications, BSNL and various large IT firms. Recyclekaro has an EV-battery recycling tie-up with Bajaj Auto and a JV, Evergreen Vaahan Recycling, on the vehicle side.

4. Funding, Listing & IPO Status

Funding raised

●        Recyclekaro is a venture-funded, Series-A-stage company. Aggregate funding is reported differently across trackers — roughly $14-18 million across 7-8 rounds — reflecting different cut-off dates and disclosure. Its first external round was around January 2020; Ascent Capital came in at the Series A stage (first investment ~March 2022).

●        Recent capital: The company infused about Rs 93 crore of capital ahead of its expansion, and Tracxn logs a further Series A round on ~10 February 2026 (reported around $3.85 million) with five investors participating.

●        Investors: Reported backers include Ascent Capital and AIG, among a mix of ~18-24 institutional investors and ~28-88 angels across rounds (figures vary by source). Founders retain majority control.

5. Planned fundraise & IPO

●        Rs 240 crore raise: In early 2026, Recyclekaro said it aims to raise Rs 240 crore in fresh equity over roughly six months, to build new facilities, add advanced extraction capability and scale capacity.

●        IPO: The company is evaluating (weighing) a potential IPO as part of a broader plan to institutionalise the business and fund long-term growth. As of the latest reporting this is under consideration — there is no confirmed IPO date, no DRHP filing, and no listing yet. Recyclekaro is a private (unlisted) company.

6. Promoters, Founders & Leadership

Rajesh Gupta — Founder & Managing Director. Started the business in 2010 and drove the pivot from paper/waste collection into e-waste and lithium-ion battery recycling and critical-metal recovery. He is the public face on strategy, technology (plasma furnace, rare earths) and India’s mineral-security narrative.

Prassann Daphal — Chief Executive Officer. Runs operations and commercial strategy; frequently represents the company on rare-earth recycling policy and expansion plans.

R&D bench: Recyclekaro emphasises an in-house R&D team (reported at ~22 members including PhDs and IIT-trained metallurgists and chemical engineers) as central to its recovery-efficiency edge. It is a founder-controlled company rather than a professionally-promoted or government entity.