Xefco is a company that is dedicated to sustainable manufacturing, with their main focus being on creating a greener supply chain for the fashion industry. In order to aid this aim, the CSIRO venture capital arm Main Sequence decided to raise some money, which resulted in a $10.5 million boost being provided to Xefco.

The funds that have now been provided to the company, will help Xefco to commercialise the company’s patented Ausora technology. This innovative technology provides the clothing with a water-free textile finishing and dyeing solution and it has been suggested by the company that this breakthrough will help to combat one of the world’s largest causes of industrial water pollution.

The forward-thinking company has based its headquarters in Sydney and it performs its research in Geelong. On top of this Xefco also has a branch office located in Tawan and has recently started working with major brands, with the result of these collaborations being Ausora. At Deakin University’s ManuFutures hub, which is based at the Waurn Ponds campus in Geelong, Xefco’s research operations have already managed to receive grants which come to an estimated total of around $4 million. This grant was awarded to the company by Deakin’s Recycling and Clean Energy Commercialisation Hub.

So far Xefco has seen a lot of success for their debut product, XReflex. The purpose of this product is to improve the thermal efficiency of insulated clothing. This product has been proven to work effectively, as it is already being used by some of the biggest brands in the world within the fashion industry. These brands include Zara, The North Face and Salomon. These innovative developments all started back in 2018, when the company was founded by Hussey and Brian Conolly. Since being created, the company has spent six years focusing on and working towards the progress of innovative textile solutions.

Furthermore, whilst the $10.5 million funding round Xefco received will be hugely beneficial to the company and their current and future projects, the money also helped the company to bring in more investments. The companies who recently became interested in Xefco’s work include, Breakthrough Victoria and Virescent Ventures. These companies chose to invest in Xefco on behalf of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation. Alongside these new investors, Xefco has also maintained a healthy relationship with their current investors, such as Investible and Voyagers Climate-Tech Fund. The money supplied by this company will be used by the company to grow and expand their team. As well as other companies who have now chosen to invest, Nightingale Partners is a company who have supported Xefco’s founders Hussey and Conolly for a very long time and continue to do so to this day.

Investment manager at Nightingale Partners, spoke about this continued investment, saying, “Nightingale Partners has supported Xefco founders Tom and Brian for over 10 years, first in Zhik and now in Xefco, and we are delighted with their progress.”

Xefco CEO and Co-Founder, Tom Hussey, commented, “The existing wet processes used to put colour and other functional properties on fabrics have the biggest environmental footprint of the entire fashion supply chain. These outdated, resource-intensive operations have not changed in centuries. It’s destroying our waterways and our planet. We’re determined to create a greener supply chain for the fashion industry.”

Hussey continued, “Our Ausora systems have been designed to plug and play into existing supply chains to help brands and manufacturers easily transition to a cleaner textile process. Dyeing and finishing drive the biggest impacts in the textile supply chain. Whereas, compared to conventional wet dyeing and finishing, our process eliminates the use of water and cuts energy, chemical consumption and cost. Our technology has the potential to stop millions of tonnes of waste entering our waterways and CO2 from entering our planet.”

Xefco says that its ‘Ausora technology could be critical in helping reduce pollutants from textile production with textile finishing and dyeing said to be responsible for a fifth of global industrial water pollution.

The company also spoke about how, ‘Ausora is said to provide the industry a greener method of waterless dyeing and finishing textiles through a unique shower plasma process that produces “the same look, feel and performance properties” of textiles with a smaller environmental footprint.’

Further to this, Xefco added that they, ‘already has a number of pilot projects under way for Ausora with major sportswear, outdoor and fashion brands.’

Investment manager at Main Sequence, Jun Qu, added that, “Xefco’s technology addresses an “often-overlooked element of the fashion supply chain, one that is critical to global climate repair. There’s no sustainable future without sustainable fashion and we see immense potential for Xefco to accelerate the decarbonisation of the global textile industry.”

Breakthrough Victoria CEO, Grant Dooley mentioned that the company, ‘also sees Xefco’s potential to help global fashion brands move towards more eco-friendly and efficient manufacturing processes. “With research and development based in Geelong and 10 regional Victorian manufacturers already collaborating with Xefco on design and manufacturing, BV believes this investment can help establish Victoria as a leader in advanced textile manufacturing systems.”’