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Princeton dropout-turned-Trenton recycler seeks $25M for acquisitions

TerraCycle CEO Tom Szaky's hopes to raise $25 million so a subsidiary can buy more recycling firms

Princeton dropout Tom Szaky's Trenton-based firm, TerraCycle, hopes to raise $25 million to buy more junk recyclers
Princeton dropout Tom Szaky's Trenton-based firm, TerraCycle, hopes to raise $25 million to buy more junk recyclersRead moreTerraCycle

TerraCycle, a Trenton garbage-recycling company, has filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission to raise $25 million in "growth capital" so its TerraCycle US LLC subsidiary can buy more recycling companies. TerraCycle plans to raise the money through a Regulation A (unaudited, minimal reporting) securities sale under regulations-loosening laws signed by President Obama in 2015 and 2012. (Read the filing here.)

The company, which employs about 60 in Trenton and 120 worldwide, nearly doubled its reported profits to $1.4 million in 2016 compared to the year before, on steady sales of $10 million a year, after cutting sales costs, according to the filing. Founder and CEO Tom Szaky, 35, who calls himself "inspired, brilliant and tireless" in the fundraising filing, started what is now TerraCycle in 2002, after dropping out of Princeton. He has promoted the company with appearances on the Garbage Moguls series on National Geographic TV and Human Resources on Pivot TV.

TerraCycle says it specializes in finding new uses for "hard-to-recycle post-consumer waste ranging from used chip bags to coffee capsules to cigarette butts," which it collects for "free" through consumer recycling programs and government subsidies.

(This item was updated 10/18)