Gresham House Ventures invests £3.5mn into sustainability impact software business Dayrize. Founded in the Netherlands in 2020, with offices in Amsterdam and London, Dayrize has developed a rapid sustainability impact assessment tool that delivers product-level insights for consumer goods brands and retailers, enabling them to be leaders in sustainability.
Its proprietary software platform and methodology bring together an array of data sources to provide a single holistic product-level sustainability score that is comparable across product categories, and detailed impact reports across five key dimensions of sustainability – Circularity, Climate Change, Ecosystem impact, Livelihood & Wellbeing and Purpose – in under two seconds.
Dayrize has quickly established its offering for rapid impact assessment, having won highly competitive grants and innovation credits from the Dutch government and the European Commission, as well as multiple innovation awards at key technology events such as CES and SXSW in the US, and the Retail Innovation Show in the UK.
The business’s customer base includes some of the world’s largest consumer goods brands and retailers, while its software is also being integrated into the client service offerings of some of the leading consultancy firms.
The business is led by co-founders Austin Simms (CEO) and Bart Nollen (Strategy) and supported by a team of sustainability experts.
Simms has 20+ years’ operating in senior roles for global consumer brands while Nollen is a successful repeat entrepreneur operating in the sustainability space.
The investment will be used to strengthen Dayrize’s capacity for serving its customer base and bolster its sales and customer success teams internationally, with a particular focus on North America.
It will also enable Dayrize to take further advantage of the ongoing shift towards greater environmental and social impact transparency, with businesses becoming more conscious of measuring and reporting meaningful sustainability data in the face of shifting regulatory and consumer demands.
The investment, led by Thomas Makey and Matt Jones, is the first institutional investment in the business and continues a busy period of dealmaking for Gresham House Ventures, including a £4.65mn investment into climate impact data business Connect Earth and a £4mn investment in neuro-inclusion solutions leader Cognassist.
Alongside the investment, Gresham House Ventures has supported Dayrize in the appointment of Andrew Anderson as Chair.
Anderson brings significant experience of founding and scaling software businesses and working with first-time founder teams, and will help to guide Dayrize’s commercial strategy.
Thomas Makey, Investment Director at Gresham House Ventures, says: “This investment will enable Dayrize to strengthen its offering to both existing and new customers internationally and aligns well with Gresham House’s expertise in managing innovative, impactful investments. We have been very impressed with Dayrize’s rapid market penetration since launch, bringing several global brands on board, as well as the expertise of its management team. We believe the business is poised to lead the way in helping consumer-facing businesses measure and improve the sustainability of their supply chains at a time when this is an increasingly significant consideration.”
Austin Simms, Founder and Chief Executive at Dayrize, says: “Increasing regulation has put pressure on companies to be more transparent with the environmental and social impact of the products they make and sell. Measuring impact at the product level has traditionally been complex and expensive, and therefore not scalable for companies with large product portfolios. The fully automated Dayrize software simplifies complexity and produces accurate results at a fraction of the cost of traditional methods. Gresham House Ventures is a leader in supporting technology-driven businesses in their early stages of growth, and we look forward to working with the team as we accelerate our international growth.”
Andrew Anderson, Chair at Dayrize, says: “This investment marks a pivotal moment in Dayrize’s evolution, validating our unique product suite and affirming our significant global potential. As Chairman, I’m thrilled to be part of the journey with such an innovative company, led by a remarkable team, and I anticipate great success, especially given the value that Dayrize enables global consumer goods brands and retailers to achieve.”
