Sachin Tendulkar invests in waste management startup Recykal; says, ‘Together, we can encourage more people’

Cricket legend Sachin Tendulkar has invested in Recykal, a Hyderabad-based waste management and circular economy startup, as a strategic investor.

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The startup said Tendulkar’s investment extends its recently closed $23 million bridge round, which it closed in June 2026.

Beyond the funding, Tendulkar will support Recykal’s efforts to promote responsible waste management and encourage recycling across India. The startup said the association would extend the spirit of the Swachh Bharat mission and push people to see waste as a resource to be recovered.

“Throughout my career, I’ve learnt that lasting success is built on discipline and consistent efforts, however big or small. The same is true for building a cleaner India. What drew me to Recykal was seeing how technology was being used to solve an everyday problem,” Tendulkar said.

“Recykal’s mission to use technology to drive behavioural change across 1 billion people is what really connected with me, and I hope together we can encourage more people to make responsible choices every day,” he added.

Abhay Deshpande, CEO and co-founder of Recykal, said the startup was built on the belief that the circular economy is a technology problem.

“Deposit Return Systems are perhaps the clearest expression of this thesis, bringing together technology, logistics and behavioural change to transform how packaging waste is recovered. To have Sachin join us as a strategic investor is incredibly meaningful,” Deshpande said.

What Recykal does

Founded in 2015 by Abhay Deshpande and Abhishek Deshpande, Recykal is led by Abhay as CEO and Abhishek as co-founder and COO. It also lists four additional co-founders as part of its leadership team.

The startup runs a technology platform that connects brands, producers, recyclers, aggregators and waste collectors. Its offerings include an extended producer responsibility (EPR) compliance suite, a marketplace for recyclable materials, Deposit Return Systems (DRS) and AI-enabled hardware such as reverse vending machines.

Recykal claims to have channelled more than 3 million metric tonnes of waste and works with around 650 brands, including Hindustan Unilever, Samsung and BMW. It also works with over 5,000 aggregators and recyclers.

Under a deposit return system, a consumer pays a small refundable deposit on a bottle or package and gets the money back when they return it. Recykal has deployed or piloted such systems in Goa, Himachal Pradesh, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Bhutan.

In June, Tamil Nadu’s state liquor retailer TASMAC installed a Recykal-supplied automated bottle return unit at a shop in Chennai as a pilot. Customers pay Rs 10 over the MRP and get it back on returning the empty bottle, with refunds sent to their UPI-linked bank accounts. The scheme came after directions from the Madras High Court to cut pollution from discarded liquor bottles.

Funding and financials

The $23 million bridge round was made up of primary and secondary capital from existing investors and a select group of new family offices. As part of the deal, early climate-focused investor Circulate Capital made a full exit, realising about 5x returns on its original investment, the startup said.

Recykal’s previous round came in April 2024, when it raised Rs 110 crore from 360 ONE Asset Management. Its earlier investors include funds managed by Morgan Stanley India.

The startup is using the latest capital to strengthen its technology platform, scale its DRS deployments and support international growth. Notably, it is exploring opportunities in Europe and the United Kingdom through organic expansion, partnerships and possible acquisitions.

In FY26, its gross revenue grew 53.2% to Rs 1,498 crore from Rs 978 crore a year earlier. Losses rose marginally to Rs 60 crore from Rs 56 crore, which brought the loss down to about 4% of gross revenue from roughly 5.7% in FY25.

Tendulkar’s other bets

Tendulkar has been investing in startups since 2013, when he backed travel company Musafir, according to data from Tracxn. He has 15 companies in his portfolio, including used car platform Spinny, JetSynthesys, Rayzon Solar and Kissht.

Spinny is the only unicorn among them.