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An Indian recycling startup won the Circular Economy Award at the World Economic Forum in Davos. Facebook’s latest acquisition suggests that biometric identity verification might be on its mind. Japan’s SoftBank Group Corp is reportedly in talks with India’s leading insurance aggregator and a $30-million moonshot prize goes unclaimed. Here’s all that happened on Startup Street this week.

Plastic Recycler Banyan Nation Honoured At WEF Davos

Plastic recycling startup Banyan Nation became India’s first firm to feature among the winners of Dell's Circular Economy People's Choice Award at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland earlier this week.

The Hyderabad-based startup won the honours for “using data intelligence to integrate a largely informal supply chain to maximise plastics recovery and reuse”, said a statement by Accenture, a co-sponosor of the awards.

"To date, Banyan has recycled more than seven million pounds of plastics and integrated more than 2,000 informal sector waste workers in their value chain." - Accenture Media Release

Founded in 2013, Banyan Nation was mentored in its early stage by global private equity firm KKR. It has partnered with T-Hub, the country's largest startup incubator, and the Telangana government for waste management. The startup collects consumer and industrial plastic waste and converts it into recycled granules called “Better Plastic”, which it claims is as good as the widely used virgin plastic.

Alsor read: Davos WEF 2018: Tata Steel Will Grow Inorganically ‘As Long As It Makes Sense’, Says Chandrasekaran

Banyan Nation worked with Tata Motors Ltd. to make new car bumpers from discarded ones. Even French cosmetics giant L'Oreal has used shampoo bottles made by Banyan Nation from old plastic bottles.

“The platform has now been extended to help cash-strapped municipalities understand waste flows through their cities and use a data-centric approach to make waste management more efficient, effective, and economical,” the startup says on its website.

It had raised $800,000 in seed funding in March 2016 from Artha Capital, according to Crunchbase.

The Annual Circulars at Davos had nearly 300 entrants from 45 countries. The awards are to recognise the firms that have made contributions to the circular economy—using resources for as long as possible and extracting the maximum out of them.

The other winners were:

Fortune Award for Circular Economy Leadership: Frans van Houten, CEO, Philips.

Frans van Houten, CEO, Philips. Accenture Strategy Award for Circular Economy Multinational: IKEA.

IKEA. Young Global Leaders Award for Circular Economy SME: Apto Solutions.

Apto Solutions. Award for Circular Economy Public Sector: Sitra.

Sitra. Ecolab Award for Circular Economy Digital Disruptor: AMP Robotics.

Biometric ID Verification On Facebook’s Mind?

View photos (Photographer: Chris Ratcliffe/Bloomberg) More

Social media giant Facebook acquired Confirm.io, which built a software that lets customers digitally verify the authenticity of an individual’s government-issued ID card. The three-year-old Boston-based startup confirmed the acquisition.

“When we launched Confirm, our mission was to become the market’s trusted identity origination platform for which other multifactor verification services can build upon,” a statement on Confirm’s website said. “Now, we're ready to take the next step on our journey with Facebook.”

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