Deanna Utroske
- Oct 5, 2023
- 2 min read

In The News: private equity backs biotech collagen

L Catterton invests in Trautec, all but guaranteeing SHRC becomes more prevalent in cosmetics and personal care.

🤑🧬Commercialized Collagen

L Catterton’s latest investment will have real implications for regenerative beauty, biotech ingredient innovation, and collagen skincare formulation.

Late last month the investment firm led a $27m Series B funding of the China-based bioscience company called Trautec.

Just as a reminder, L Catterton—the world’s largest, diversified consumer-dedicated private equity firm—was born in 2016, when the Catterton fund teamed up with LVMH and Groupe Arnault.

Trautec specializes in synthetic recombinant human collagen (SRHC); that is, collagen proteins synthesized via biotech. The company has secured multiple patents and is at scale with its production capabilities for Type I, II, III, and XVII SRHC. The company entered the US beauty ingredient marketplace in 2022. And this new funding will allow Trautec to further expand internationally and do it faster as well as to serve more skincare makers. (Trautec’s SRHC also has applications in the medical and aesthetic sectors.)

The collagen producer’s partners to-date include: Shiseido, Winona Skincare (a China-based cosmeceutical brand), Proya (which Premium Beauty News called ‘one of China’s strongest beauty brands in 2022), and Jala Group (maker of some 7 beauty brands). And according to a press release circulated by the company just last month, “several more [beauty partnerships] are in the pipeline.”

Commenting on the newly announced funding, Scott Chen, a managing partner in the RMB fund of L Catterton, emphasizes, “Trautec has demonstrated that it is able to develop technologies that are at the forefront of the SRHC industry and also commercialize them for practical use in products that consumers value.”

“Impressively,” he believes, the bioscience company “has done so in a balanced and prudent manner, [as evidenced by Trautec] quintupling revenue and growing profit over the past two years even as it continued investing in research and development to stay ahead of the curve.”

And Chen notes that this funding round will not only support the business internationally but growth within China as well: “We look forward to working closely with its management team, supporting the company's domestic and international expansion initiatives.”

Qian Song, Founder of Trautec, underlines the fact that this deal will only elevate the company’s standing in the cosmetics industry, saying, “SRHC is gaining more and more traction in the cosmetics market and field of regenerative medicine, creating incredible scope for our solutions to be applied to many consumer products. We are thrilled that L Catterton has joined us on our journey as the firm's extensive experience, expertise, and network in the global beauty and personal care industry will enable us to embark on a new phase of exciting growth.”