Optocycle

From Vision to Reality: The Origin Story of Optocycle

The construction industry is responsible for the largest material flow worldwide – and at the same time, it is one of the sectors with the greatest untapped potential for a true circular economy. This is exactly where Optocycle comes in. The startup, founded in Tübingen in 2022, has a clear vision: A world where every construction waste is new building material.

Die Idee zu Optocycle entstand aus einem zunächst ganz anderen Anwendungsfall. Die beiden Gründer Max-Frederick Gerken und Lars Wolff arbeiteten ursprünglich an intelligenter Bilderkennung im Handel. Der entscheidende Wendepunkt kam durch einen engen Kontakt zur Recyclingbranche: Ein Unternehmerfreund machte die Gründer auf ein zentrales Problem aufmerksam, die fehlende Transparenz bei mineralischen Bauabfällen. Materialzusammensetzungen wurden bislang überwiegend per Sichtprüfung geschätzt: langsam, subjektiv und fehleranfällig.

For Gerken and Wolff, it quickly became clear: Their technology can have a significantly greater impact here than in the original application field. Optocycle was born.

The Founders: Entrepreneurial Drive Meets Technological Depth

Max-Frederick Gerken

CEO & Co-Founder

Max-Frederick Gerken is the strategic mind behind Optocycle. With a business background (University of Tübingen), he is responsible for business development, market strategy, and vision. His drive: to make the construction industry structurally more sustainable and data-driven. For his work on intelligent, sustainable business models, he was named to the Forbes "30 under 30" DACH list in 2024.

Lars Wolff

CTO & Co-Founder

As the technical director, Lars Wolff is the mastermind behind the Optocycle technology. He is responsible for the entire product development – from optical sensors to machine learning models and the software platform. Wolff brings experience from a US tech startup as well as from electrical engineering and met Gerken during his computer science studies in Tübingen.

The Breakthrough: Pilot Plants and First Industrial Applications

A key milestone was the collaboration with Heinrich Feess GmbH & Co. KG, one of the most innovative construction waste recyclers in Germany. There, Optocycle installed its first pilot plant and tested the technology for the first time under real industrial conditions. From the truck to the tipping point and onto the conveyor belt, material flows were captured and analyzed seamlessly for the first time. The success of this pilot plant laid the foundation for scaling: Within a short time, over ten pilot projects followed across Germany, with clients such as Heidelberg Materials, ALBA, CEMEX, and OTTO DÖRNER. Today, Optocycle serves over 30 clients in Germany, Spain, and France.

Technological core: Machine Learning, multispectral sensing, and Edge Computing

Optocycle combines multispectral cameras, computer vision technology, and edge computing to analyze mineral construction waste in real time. The specially developed machine learning model recognizes material types such as concrete, bricks, or gypsum, identifies contaminants, determines grain sizes, and provides objective quantity and quality data – directly at the process point.

The result is a "Single Source of Truth" for the material flow: subjective estimates are replaced by reliable data. This creates transparency, lowers costs, reduces conflicts, and enables high-quality recycling instead of downcycling.

Conclusion: Optocycle as a Pioneer of the Circular Construction Economy

Optocycle demonstrates how deep tech, entrepreneurial spirit, and sustainability can work together. From a specific industry challenge, a scalable key technology has emerged within a few years that has the potential to fundamentally change the construction and recycling industries.

With a clear focus on data, transparency, and circular economy, Optocycle is working to turn waste back into valuable materials – and to make the vision a reality that every construction waste is new building material.