DEScycle, a developer of next-generation metals processing infrastructure, has announced a strategic partnership with global business giant Mitsubishi Corporation (MC), marking a major step in advancing sustainable e-waste recycling.
The deal builds on MC’s investment in DEScycle last year and names the two companies as preferred partners for the Japanese market. Together, they will pursue opportunities in the recovery and processing of metals from electronic waste, combining DEScycle’s proprietary platform with MC’s global trading network, operational expertise, and market reach.
Mitsubishi Corporation will leverage its extensive customer relationships to market critical and precious metals recovered using DEScycle’s technology, while applying its investment experience to explore new avenues for growth.
As electrification, AI, and advanced manufacturing drive soaring demand for critical and strategic minerals, the pressure to expand cost-efficient metals recovery has intensified. DEScycle is currently constructing a demonstration plant in the UK, funded by MC, intended to serve as a blueprint for future scalable deployments.
DEScycle’s ionometallurgy platform, built on deep eutectic solvent chemistry, promises metals recovery at a fraction of the cost of traditional smelting. The capital-light technology consumes significantly less energy, reduces environmental impact, and treats e-scrap as a valuable secondary resource, supporting circular economy goals and domestic metals supply.
“Partnering with Mitsubishi enables us to explore opportunities to deploy our platform in Japan, which is known for being a global leader in e-waste recycling,” said Fred White, Co-founder and CCO at DEScycle.
“Alongside the UK and Japan, we aim to expand into the US and Europe, replicating this model through distributed, repeatable deployments, capturing above-ground resources of critical materials and unlocking sovereign supply chains.”
Toshihiko Satomi, Senior Vice President and General Manager of Mitsubishi Corporation’s Mineral Resources Group CEO office, added: “DEScycle’s technology has great potential in the Japanese market to advance resource circulation and sustainable metals recovery, and we view this partnership as an important step in exploring its application in Japan.”
