Greenairy bets plant towers, not HEPA filters, can strip toxic gases from offices

Greenairy builds smart plant towers that draw in air, break down toxic gases and release purified air for offices, schools, hotels and other sealed commercial buildings

That conditioned plant towers — not HEPA filters or ionizers — can strip toxic gases such as formaldehyde and benzene from office air fast enough to sell

Tanvi Thombre and Lakshya Saraf were engineering students working in their university makerspace when, in Thombre's words, they were 'unknowingly exposed to toxic fumes from laser cutters, 3D printers, and soldering irons' — a danger they only understood after her best friend fainted and had to be hospitalised.

The pair ran short-term pilots in offices around Singapore. In their own three-way test using RESET-certified monitors, a Greenairy tower beat a medical-grade ionizer and a HEPA purifier on both VOC level and removal speed; they report an immediate 50% reduction in daily VOC average and peak levels within regular office hours. TÜV SÜD has validated the results, publication pending. The founders operate from opposite sides of the world — Saraf fundraising in Berkeley, Thombre testing in Singapore.

Purifier filters cover only 'a narrow range of VOCs' and need frequent replacement, while plants need no filter changes and produce no harmful byproducts.

Office staff in the pilots also preferred the towers' natural aroma and ambience, giving the product a second benefit beyond the measurement.

Third-party validation strategy: the founders routed their self-run results through TÜV SÜD before publishing, to be certifiable at launch.

Attack the pollutant your incumbent ignores: purifiers own particles, so a challenger that owns gases starts with a category instead of a market share fight.

As of October 2026, Greenairy was selected for TechCrunch Disrupt's Startup Battlefield 200, with TÜV SÜD validation done and publication pending. The founders planned to reunite in Singapore by the first half of 2027 to launch the first mass-produced towers and install them for their first customers.