PUMA and RE&UP Announce a Multi-Year Collaboration to Scale Circular Textile Solution
Sports company PUMA and RE&UP Recycling Technologies have signed a Letter of Intent (LoI) to scale a fully circular textile solution, transforming textile waste into RE&UP’s Next-Gen Recycled Cotton Fibers and Recycled Polyester Chips, materials that maintain the same performance as virgin fibers.
For more than 75 years, PUMA has pushed sport and culture forward by creating fast products for the world’s fastest athletes. The company distributes its products in more than 120 countries, employs about 20,000 people worldwide.
Circularity is one of the focus areas of PUMA’s Vision 2030 sustainability goals and the company has already scaled up its RE:FIBRE textile-to-textile recycling program, producing millions of football jerseys made out of an increasing share of recycled textiles. RE&UP has become a key Next-Gen raw material partner in the RE:FIBRE program supporting PUMA’s ambition to reduce reliance on bottle-
recycled polyester, enhancing true circularity while minimizing textile waste. Due to its previous success, this collaboration has now evolved into a broader global commitment to fully enabling circularity.
“As part of our Vision 2030 goals, we want to have 30% of our polyester fabric in apparel fiber-to-fiber recycled by 2030 and our collaboration with RE&UP opens exciting possibilities for integrating virgin-equivalent recycled materials into our products,” said Howard Williams, Director Global Innovation Apparel & Accessories at PUMA. “These materials offer the performance we need while helping us achieve our circularity goals.”
As part of the expansion, PUMA will introduce RE:FIBRE to the Americas, leveraging RE&UP’s recycled raw materials within its local supply chain. Both companies have a long-term commitment to scaling sustainable solutions in the textile industry.
RE&UP’s revolutionary recycling technology is a key enabler of the circular transition of the industry, especially due to its unique capability to process diverse textile feedstocks, including post-consumer and post-industrial waste, as well as complex blended textiles like polycotton and polyester-elastane –materials, traditionally difficult to recycle. Powered with 100% renewable energy and leveraging advanced technologies such as decolorization processes, RE&UP sets a new benchmark for sustainable, low-impact recycled textile fibers.
RE&UP creates a seamless circular ecosystem that transforms end-of-life textile waste into high-quality raw materials at scale: a commitment to opening up a more responsible and technologically evolved future for textiles and fashion.
“We are proud to elevate our collaboration with PUMA to the next level, building on our existing work through PUMA’s RE:FIBRE program,” said Özgür Atsan, Chief Commercial Officer at RE&UP.
“PUMA, as one of the most forward-thinking brands in the industry, shares our vision for closing the recycled material gap. The proven quality of our products, our ability to process diverse textile compositions, our annual capacity of 80,000 tons, and our commitment to renewable energy reinforces our mission to produce Next-Gen materials and establish circularity as the standard for the textile industry,” Atsan continues. “We proudly define our products as Next-Gen materials, as they are designed to meet the needs of the next generation in the textile industry.”
