A Gram-positive, spore-forming, aerobic, filamentous bacterium, strain JFMB-ATET, was isolated in 2008 during environmental screening of a plastic surface in grade C in a contract manufacturing organization in southern Germany. The isolate grew at temperatures of 25–50 °C and at pH 5.0–8.5, forming ivory-coloured colonies with sparse white aerial mycelia. Chemotaxonomic and molecular characteristics of the isolate matched those described for members of the family Thermoactinomycetaceae, except that the cell-wall peptidoglycan contained ll-diaminopimelic acid, while all previously described members of this family display this diagnostic diamino acid in meso-conformation. The DNA G+C content of the novel strain was 54.6 mol%, the main polar lipids were diphosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidylethanolamine and phosphatidylglycerol, and the major menaquinone was MK-7. The major fatty acids had saturated C14–C16 branched chains. No diagnostic sugars were detected. Based on the chemotaxonomic results and 16S rRNA gene sequence analysis, the isolate is proposed to represent a novel genus and species, Kroppenstedtia eburnea gen. nov. sp. nov. The type strain is JFMB-ATET ( = DSM 45196T  = NRRL B-24804T  = CCUG 59226T).