European startups are rethinking what happens to food once it leaves the traditional supply chain. What was once seen mainly as waste, from surplus groceries and restaurant stock to side-streams such as spent yeast, broccoli stems, and industrial by-products, is increasingly being turned into more affordable food options, alternative ingredients, animal feed, and even fertilisers.
This shift is gaining momentum across the FoodTech sector, where food waste innovation has moved from a niche sustainability concern into a more mature and commercially relevant space. Established players such as Too Good To Go, OLIO, or Winnow are showing how food waste innovation has matured. While Too Good To Go has become one of the best-known names in surplus food, OLIO has built a community-powered redistribution model with a million users globally – as discussed in the EU-Startups podcast. And Winnow has become a recognised player in AI-enabled food waste tracking for kitchens.
Together, these companies show that the sector is moving beyond sustainability alone and becoming a practical business opportunity. Today, the market spans into retail surplus, AI waste tracking, or ingredient upcycling, reflecting a broader shift in how Europe’s startup ecosystem is tackling food waste.
For this article, we curated a list of 10 promising startups founded between 2020 and 2026 that are challenging conventional systems in a bid to cut down on food waste.
Clean Food Group produces sustainable food ingredients designed to offer cleaner alternatives to conventional fats and oils, speecifically high-impact ingredients such as palm oil, cocoa butter, and milk fat – aiming to reduce pressure on food supply chains and limit waste from inefficient production models.
Its approach focuses on maintaining taste and performance while making better use of resources and reducing reliance on traditional fat and oil sources. London-based and launched in 2022, the startup has raised €14.3 million in total funding, supporting its mission to create ingredients that are better for the environment and health.
Founded in 2024 in Zagreb, Crumbs is a platform focused on reducing food waste by connecting consumers with surplus food from local restaurants and wholesalers. By helping businesses sell food that might otherwise go unsold, it supports a more efficient local food system.
The startup has raised €600k in total funding, with the fresh capital set to support growth in Croatia, regional expansion, and the development of AI tools to optimise food supply chains. Its model combines affordable access to food with a practical solution for businesses managing unsold stock.
Headquartered in Espoo, Enifer produces fungi-based protein through a bioprocess. By converting dilute side streams from biorefineries into a nutritious, animal-free ingredient, the startup turns industrial by-products into a valuable protein source for food, pet food, and aquafeed producers.
Launched in 2020, its approach helps reduce reliance on traditional animal and soy proteins while creating new revenue streams from materials that would otherwise be underused. Since its funding, they secured €37.9 million in total funding.
We are particularly delighted to include GreenBytes, as they were the winner of the EU-Startups Summit pitch competition in 2022! This Reykjavík-based company provides an AI-powered software platform for restaurants. Founded by two sustainable energy experts with restaurant experience, GreenBytes developed its platform after identifying how difficult stock ordering can be in busy kitchens.
Its tool helps kitchens optimise food ordering and reduce waste by predicting future sales using historical data, weather, and other factors, giving restaurants automated stock tracking, ingredient suggestions, and a clearer view of what they actually need. Launched in 2020, GreenBytes has secured €1.0 million in funding.
Founded in 2021, NANDO is an Italian startup developing AI-driven solutions for waste monitoring across the waste management value chain. Its technologies support municipal waste collection optimisation and help improve data collection and analytics, including applications linked to reducing food waste.
Its approach helps cities and organisations make waste management more efficient by using better data to identify patterns, reduce inefficiencies, and improve collection processes. Since its founding, NANDO has raised €3.3 million in funding, supporting the expansion of its AI tools and monitoring systems.
Headquartered in Dublin, Positive Carbon provides fully automated food waste monitoring for catering and hospitality businesses. Its system tracks and categorises kitchen waste, helping hotels, restaurants, and catering teams identify what is being thrown away and make better purchasing decisions.
They have developed a SaaS model that combines waste tracking, expert guidance, and environmental reporting, helping clients improve profitability while meeting sustainability and ESG goals. Launched in 2020, they have secured €2.2 million in funding, supporting their mission to help food businesses cut waste by up to 50%.
Reduced is a Danish startup developing natural flavour enhancers by upcycling produce and food industry side-streams. Through its fermentation-based “waste to taste” approach, the startup turns materials such as broken rice and lentils, apple cores, surplus mushrooms, and retired laying hens into clean-label flavour solutions.
Launched in 2020, its model tackles waste by turning low-value by-products into higher-value flavour solutions, while offering manufacturers more sustainable alternatives to conventional savoury ingredients. Reduced raised €21.3 million in total funding.
Founded in 2021 in the Netherlands, Revyve creates sustainable food ingredients by upcycling brewers’ spent yeast into functional proteins and fibres. Instead of growing new biomass, the startup taps into an abundant brewing by-product to create clean-label ingredients that can replace eggs and additives in mainstream foods.
Its ingredients offer gelling, binding, and emulsification properties, helping improve food texture while giving brewer’s yeast a higher-value second life. Revyve successfully raised €30.04 million in funding, supporting its work with food manufacturers across plant-based and animal-free products.
Upcycled Plant Power (UPP) harvests protein-rich and fibre-rich ingredients from broccoli waste. Its system targets the stems, stalks, and leaves often left behind in the field, turning underused crop biomass into ingredients for food manufacturers, such as plant-based protein, fibre fractions, and broccoli-based powders.
Launched in 2022 in Newport, its model gives farmers a new revenue stream from material previously treated as waste, while supplying ingredients for products such as plant-based foods, smoothies, breads, and sauces. UPP has raised €3.2 million in total funding, supporting its on-farm upcycling technology.
Uusimaa-based Volare is building and scaling technology that converts food industry side-streams into sustainable insect protein, oil, and fertilisers. At the core of its approach is the black soldier fly, which naturally turns food industry by-products into high-value resources instead of letting them go to waste.
Volare upcycles materials that might otherwise be incinerated into ingredients designed to replace less sustainable alternatives. Its model supports a more circular food system by transforming low-value side-streams into useful products for feed, agriculture, and industry.
Read the orginal article: https://www.eu-startups.com/2026/06/reinventing-food-waste-10-european-startups-creating-value-from-leftovers/
