European circular scale-up Nornorm has announced a €110 mln funding round, led by investment firm Verdane, alongside Inter Ikea Group and Philian.

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Nornorm is a subscription-based furnishing service that enables businesses to move from single-use office furniture to a circular model. As well as improving flexibility and cost efficiency for landlords and business owners, the firm helps its customers significantly reduce their environmental impact by moving to a circular model that extends the lifecycle of office furniture by 3x.

With the additional support from Verdane, the company will use the funding round as a launchpad for further global expansion. Nornorm is currently operating in Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Germany, France, Netherlands, Belgium, Poland and Austria. The company has also recently entered the UK market, and plans to enter the US in 2023.

Nornorm was co-founded with Inter IKEA Development in 2020. In under two years, the firm has sold over 200,000 m2 of office furniture subscriptions. Nornorm’s international customer base includes Volvo, Electrolux, Castellum, IWG, Wolt, Miro, Edge, and Netflix.

‘To grow and adapt to the future, all companies need to rethink and fully adopt circular models, and move away from the linear business model. This is just the beginning of the movement. All industries will be affected, and to survive and thrive business leaders have to be prepared to change. The circular movement will have a bigger impact on industries than the Internet revolution,’ said Jonas Kjellberg, co-founder and chairman of the board at Nornorm.
 
‘The same way Tesla’s electrification of cars has influenced the motor industry, we want to be the catalyst of change to circularity in the workspace industry,’ commented Anders Jepsen, CEO at Nornorm.

‘A systemic shift from single use to circular is needed across the economy; this is a key investment thesis for Verdane. Nornorm aims to extend the lifetime of office furniture from six years to 20, or even 30 years. Given most office furniture still ends up in a landfill, this would be a significant step change for the circular economy,’ said Erik Osmundsen, partner at Verdane.

The investment was made from Verdane’s Idun I fund, which is classified as 'Article 9' under the European Union’s Finance Disclosure Regulation. Idun I makes investments focused on driving impact in three clusters: energy transition; sustainable consumption; and resilient communities.