An award-winning laundry service, founded at Oxford, is aiming to disrupt the industry by reducing emissions, saving water and removing plastic waste.
Dr Kyle Grant, founder of environmentally-friendly laundry and wet cleaning business, Oxwash, was halfway through a DPhil in synthetic biology when he hit upon the idea of launching a service to wash the clothes of fellow students. Before Kyle was immersed in the entrepreneurial atmosphere of Oxford University, he had been a scientist at NASA.
Over the next couple of years his idea developed, aided by mentoring from his Oxford college, free business support from the University’s Entrepreneurship Centre at the Saïd Business School, and an accelerator programme run by the Oxford Foundry, which has since merged with the Saïd Business School.
Today, Oxwash aims to be the first net zero laundry business in the world by 2030. It has already rolled out three ‘lagoons’ – in Oxford, London and Cambridge – and has raised nearly £5m from investors, including Twitter co-founder, Biz Stone and the Branson family. Holly Branson recently commented, ‘Oxwash is one of my favourite sustainable start-ups and a business we’re proud to invest in.’
Read the full story here.
To find out more about innovation at University of Oxford visit https://www.ox.ac.uk/research/engage-with-us/external-organisations/innovation-oxford
Tags: Arc universities group, Business support, Energy, environment, next generation
