Zincovery: Leading the future of clean metal refining

Zinc is the fourth most-used metal in the world, with around US$10 billion in zinc dust created each year from the steel recycling industry. Currently, only about 50% of it is recovered in a costly process with a high carbon footprint. Zincovery’s groundbreaking technology is set to transform the global metal refining market by recovering zinc and other critical metals at half the cost and with up to 95% lower emissions.

Founded in 2021 by Jonathan Ring and Professor Aaron Marshall out of the University of Canterbury (UC), Zincovery’s technology combines protected innovations across metals reduction and electrochemistry, with the potential to mitigate over 1 billion tonnes of CO₂ from critical minerals refining.

Zincovery has raised NZ$20 million in funding, and deployed this to achieve several major milestones, including signing commercial agreements worth over NZ$500 million, building a fully functional pilot plant with 10 tonne-per-year zinc capacity, and beginning works on a 1,000 tonne-per-year demonstration facility in Christchurch – the largest of its kind in NZ.

The company also shines as an example of a successful university spin-out, built on a strong and ongoing partnership. UC played a pivotal role in supporting the technology’s commercialisation and securing its intellectual property, laying the groundwork for long-term success.

Today, Zincovery continues to operate its lab and pilot plant from UC facilities, actively collaborates with UC academics and students, and has assembled a high-performing team of researchers and engineers—many of whom are UC graduates.

Zincovery is on the path to reach US$1 billion revenue in the next 10 years and is fast emerging as a global leader in clean tech and resource recovery.

“Zincovery’s technology has the potential to dramatically reduce the environmental impact of the multi-billion-dollar global zinc recycling industry, while strengthening New Zealand’s clean tech position as we expand our team of local researchers and engineers and scale plant operations.”

– Jonathan Ring, CEO and Co-Founder, Zincovery