Glacier, a company specialising in AI and robotics for the recycling industry, has secured an additional $7.7m investment from Amazon’s Climate Pledge Fund, as well as New Enterprise Associates.

The investment also includes contributions from AlleyCorp, Overture Climate VC, and VSC Ventures. 

Glacier has developed AI-powered robots for automating the process of sorting recyclables, gathering real-time data to improve recycling rates, and preventing valuable materials such as metals and plastics from ending up in landfills and oceans. 

The company's proprietary AI model can identify more than 30 categories of recyclable materials, from polyethylene terephthalate plastic to toothpaste tubes.  

All the items collected by Glacier are sent to a materials recovery facility (MRF) for sorting, where one Glacier robot can prevent more than ten million items from being discarded in landfills, annually.  

The company, co-founded by Rebecca Hu and Areeb Malik, will use the fresh capital infusion to further develop its low-cost AI-enabled robots. It will also allocate a significant portion of the investment for team expansion.  

Furthermore, Glacier is collaborating with Amazon to test this robotic technology for minimising landfill waste and promoting recycled materials’ use in packaging. 

Hu and her team are developing computer-vision technology for identifying a wide range of items in the recycling waste stream, from cardboard to catfood cans. 

Amazon Climate Pledge Fund principal Nick Ellis said: “Partnering with Glacier will enable us to test the role of novel AI and robotics-based recycling technologies so that we can identify and aggregate novel packaging materials that can ultimately be recycled and repurposed.”