This is a bet on execution in packaging innovation because regulation, sustainability targets and cost pressure are colliding faster than traditional R&D can respond.
German packaging tech startup one.five has raised EUR 14 million in a Series A funding round, according to FinSMEs. The investor group includes Dr. Hans Riegel Holding (a Haribo shareholder), 212 NexT, Symbia VC, btomorrow ventures, KIMPA Impact, Zubi Capital, Speedinvest, Planet A, Green Generation Fund and Climentum Capital.
Why this round matters
Packaging companies are being pushed to innovate faster while staying inside tightening regulatory and sustainability requirements. The problem is structural: traditional workflows are slow, iterative and often disconnected from real market demand. In that environment, the cost of getting material choices wrong is rising.
one.five is positioning itself as infrastructure for faster decision-making. The company’s AI platform embeds product-market fit into material development, translating technical performance, regulatory compliance and cost targets into data-driven designs. The pitch is not incremental optimisation, but removing the trial-and-error cycle that makes packaging R&D expensive and unreliable.
The company is explicit about the inefficiency it is attacking: R&D failure rates can reach 60%, creating wasted time, wasted material and delayed launches. one.five says its approach reduces those missteps, shortens time-to-market and produces packaging designs that balance performance, sustainability and cost from inception.
What one.five is building
At the core is what the company calls a Product Market Fit Compass. The tool benchmarks product portfolios against real brand and consumer needs and then defines precise development targets. In practice, that means narrowing the search space for new materials and formats before expensive lab work and industrial trials begin.
For packaging buyers and converters, the commercial logic is straightforward: if a platform can cut the number of dead-end development cycles, it can improve speed, reduce scrap and increase the likelihood that a new packaging solution actually reaches shelves.
one.five also frames the platform as a route to reducing non-recyclable packaging by systematically steering development toward solutions that meet both sustainability criteria and functional requirements.
Use of proceeds and go-to-market
The company plans to use the funding to scale the platform, enhance AI capabilities and expand to new customer groups across the packaging value chain. That expansion point is key: packaging innovation decisions sit across brands, material suppliers, converters and machinery ecosystems. A platform approach only becomes defensible when it is embedded across those interfaces.
one.five says its solutions are validated on leading machinery with customers including BioSun and Starkraft, pointing to early industrial relevance rather than purely theoretical modelling.
The strategic read
This funding round fits a broader shift: sustainability compliance is no longer a branding add-on, and packaging is increasingly treated as an engineered constraint system. Investors are backing tools that reduce uncertainty and compress development timelines, rather than single-point material bets.
The execution risk is equally clear. Platforms win when they are trusted by technical teams and procurement at the same time, and when they can prove repeatable outcomes across categories. one.five’s claim of eliminating “guesswork” will ultimately be tested in customer renewal cycles and in how well the platform performs as requirements change.
For now, the round gives one.five capital and a strategically relevant investor set to push its thesis: turn packaging innovation into a market-validated, data-driven process instead of an expensive sequence of trials.