The Hamburg biotech startup COLIPI, which was founded in 2022 by Jonas Heuer, Max Webers, Philipp Arbter and Tyll Utesch from Hamburg University of Technology (TUHH ), is setting new standards for sustainable innovation. The team, which was supported in its founding process by Startup Port@TUHH, recently celebrated two major successes:
The company is awarded first place in the Food/AgriTech category of the Süddeutsche Zeitung’s Gipfelstürmer Award. Colipi received the award for its innovative “Climate Oil”, which offers a CO₂-neutral alternative to palm oil and crude oil – produced in a gas fermentation bioreactor in which yeasts and bacteria convert CO₂ into plant oil-like lipids. The solution enables applications in cosmetics, food, e-fuels and bioplastics and addresses one of the biggest ecological challenges: palm oil production. “We are already producing several hundred kilos – next year it should be tons,” said co-founder Maximilian Webers at the award ceremony. He counters the EU’s lengthy regulatory process with the fact that he himself has already eaten the Colipi fat – “and I’m still alive,” says Weber.
The second success and a milestone for the young company is the partnership with ContiTech. Colipi is expected to rent office, research and production space at the Continental division’s site in Harburg from summer 2026. The startup intends to use CO₂-containing exhaust air from steam generation to cultivate microorganisms and produce valuable biological materials. The plan is to build one of the world’s largest bioreactors for industrial CO₂ utilization, in which bacteria use carbon dioxide (CO₂), hydrogen (H₂) and oxygen (O₂) to produce products such as climate oil as a sustainable alternative to vegetable oils such as palm oil.
Initial tests have already been successful. They show the decisive advantage of the biological process over the chemical-catalytic process: the biological processes are much more robust and tolerant of quality fluctuations and impurities in the exhaust gas. The microorganisms used grow even with untreated combustion gas. “As a spin-off of the TUHH, we are particularly pleased to have found a strong partner here in Hamburg-Harburg in ContiTech, which not only offers us premises for our growth, but also contributes to our field test with CO₂-containing exhaust gases,” says Max Webers, one of the founders.
For Dirk Stuhrmann, Head of Continental’s Hamburg site, the collaboration with Colipi is “the result of a committed cooperation with the TUHH, Tutech Innovation GmbH and network partners from the south of Hamburg, such as Tempowerk Technologiepark Hamburg in this case. We hope that this cooperation will enable us to take a major step towards climate neutrality for our location,” says Stuhrmann.
Colipi’s two successes are also a prime example of the innovative strength of Hamburg’s start-up scene and the importance of networks such as Startup Port for successful start-ups.
Other winners of the Gipfelstürmer Award:
In the Energy category Heatrix makes it onto the winners’ podium. In the Health category Meliodays Medical took home the prize.
