Marine industry startups: the ones to watch

Marine Industry News caught up with some of the marine industry startups that showcased at the Start-Up Pavilion at Metstrade 2024.

X-fender

X-fender claims to be the world’s first flatpack boat fender. The Finnish startup is now commercialising its space-saving airless boat fender and is entertaining global interest. The concept was born when one of the co-founders was on holiday and began wondering what a fender would look like if it could be folded away for storing.

According to the startup, the X-Fender offers several benefits for boat owners thanks to its foldable, airless design. Kare continues: “Customer feedback has been overwhelmingly positive so we really feel that we have something that boaters have been waiting for.” The design of X-fenders means they are lower profile to store and when in use, owners can open them up to broaden the protective area.

Kare is always open to collaboration and says on entering the marine field: “We feel that we have a solid business plan but it would be nice to know if there is something that we have missed. 

“Our biggest opportunity is the fact that everybody needs fenders and nobody seems to like the current ones. Our biggest challenge is to get boaters to recognise why X-fender would be a better product than the old fenders. The market is a bit conservative so our biggest challenge might be encouraging people to challenge their old perspectives.”

Seaotool

Seaotool is a carbon accounting platform purpose-built for the marine industry. The company developed its platform to respond to the growing need for ESG and emissions reporting in the industry.

Zennor Pascoe, CEO, says: “We knew, from previous experience, that when you are running carbon footprints for complex organisations with specific and complex operational profiles, the process of running carbon footprints and accessing data for sustainability related decisions and investments is made much easier if you use a sector specific tool. There wasn’t a really comprehensive carbon accounting platform designed specifically for the leisure and commercial marine sectors… so we built one.”

Pascoe says the startup has two types of competitor: corporate carbon accounting platforms and shipping carbon accounting platforms. 

“While both are very good, we are the only solution that provides a bespoke carbon accounting tool for the small commercial and leisure marine sector for both corporate and vessel emissions accounting across all three scopes, and produces data that is compliant to reporting under frameworks such as Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) and Streamlined Energy & Carbon Reporting (SECR) etc.,” he adds.  

Seaotool has noted more readiness to adopt this technology in the EU, as the CSRD emissions requires reporting of data that the Seaotool is built to deliver.

“One big lesson has been understanding how to approach and talk about sustainability and emissions reporting to the industry. While the industry knows that sustainability is a priority, due to unclear regulations and requirements for the leisure and small commercial marine sector, everybody is waiting for clear guidelines on best practice before real action on emissions reduction will take place,” says Pascoe.

“There are huge opportunities for us as companies the world over have to start reporting emissions for compliance or voluntary purposes. Every time we run a carbon footprint, we deliver knowledge to a client about their emissions that they didn’t know. And we enable them to make better decisions to reduce it. The biggest challenge is the lack of clarity from the IMO on the wider marine sector in terms of best practise for emissions reporting for vessels.”

Monimoto

Monimoto is a GPS tracker and a smartphone app, which has been highly successful in the motorcycle aftermarket segment. 

The company is now entering the marine market with Monimoto 9 – a battery-powered, GPS-based tracker designed to help prevent theft, provide instant boat movement alerts and enable fast recovery. 

Andrius Bruno Rimkunas, co-founder, says the team identified a lack of simple, reliable, and affordable anti-theft solutions specifically designed for outboard engines, boats, and other valuable marine assets. 

Monimoto 9 requires no professional installation and is battery-powered. It offers real-time tracking, instant alerts, and long battery life. “The biggest lesson has been understanding the importance of user simplicity,” says Rimkunas. “Consumers want a product that doesn’t require extensive installation or maintenance. We’ve also learned that offering high-quality support and educating customers on the benefits of anti-theft devices greatly increases user satisfaction and product success.”

“Having learned valuable lessons in the motorcycle niche, we believe Monimoto will become unbeatable in helping boat owners protect their property. We see future iterations offering even more robust features. The biggest opportunity lies in expanding into more specialised marine niches, such as protecting outboard engines and personal watercraft, where theft rates are rising.”

While Monimoto can be utilised in any boating area, the GPS tracker could be particularly useful for boat owners using remote harbours and marinas with limited security infrastructure. Rimkunas adds: “We are in discussions with several marine dealerships and distribution networks to expand Monimoto 9’s presence in this sector.”

Suspension Systems

Suspension Systems specialises in lower profile suspension technology that counters seat vibration. Peter Johnson, CEO, says: “Boat seat suspensions take up precious space due to having to sit on a pedestal or needing 20-30cm of space under the seat to provide shock and vibration protection. Our boat seat suspension is 11cm high – ⅓ to ½ the thickness of our competitors and fits where most conventional suspensions cannot.

“To absorb shocks, traditional boat seat suspensions have to be stiff and unforgiving. As a result, the fatiguing, high-frequency vibration from normal wave chatter just passes through the suspension to the seat occupant. Rather than being stiff and unforgiving, our suspension provides a soft ride when going over wave chatter and opens and stiffens when going over large waves, providing proactive shock protection. None of our competitors provide proactive shock protection.”

In terms of penetrating the boat seat market, the next step for the Suspension Systems is finding the right business partners. “We want to license our revolutionary, patented, high-performing, low-profile suspension design, rather than build and directly sell seats, so we need to find willing and interested manufacturing and distribution partners.

“The opportunities for our product are daunting and large as shock and vibration mitigation is not unique to boats. Our technology has been tested in land vehicles and, compared to conventional seat suspensions, reduces the vibration by up to 50 per cent. The biggest challenge, is to generate the capital to be able to develop, expand and explore in parallel all the addressable markets.”

ESEA Propulsion

Founded in Menorca, Spain, ESEA Propulsion is building the next generation of electric outboards.

Carlos Puerta, CEO and co-founder says: “We saw that there were not many improvements in terms of mechanical design in the industry of electric outboards. In addition, conventional outboards generally have big volume, which results in less space in the back of the board. One of the advantages that electrification brings you is the chance to rethink the whole design and play with the elements in order to get an alternative distribution system.” 

Puerta says the team has developed a system that offers customers low line design with less volume. “The solution gives not only higher ergonomy for the crew but also an extra available capacity for boatbuilders to redefine the space in the deck.”

According to ESEA, most products offering the same performance range are outboards based on refits, consisting of installing electric instead of combustion engines but keeping the same mechanical architecture. 

Reflecting on the company journey so far, Puerta believes there are three main factors that make it easier to achieve success. 

“First, good project design and planning is very important. The uniqueness of the idea is good but it is more important to design a very concise business plan explaining how you answer a market need and how you will execute that. Second, you must plan all resources – squeezing them carefully to give as much results to potential investors. Third, and the most important for me, it is to surround yourself with a team that will push the project beyond the objectives.”

The startup is currently working with a research and development test centre. Before coming to market, the team will run trials and then on-water tests will follow. 

While electrification has a certain place in the future of the leisure marine market, external and socioeconomic factors make the outlook a little tricky to predict. 

“One of the main questions in the marine industry is how will the market react to electrification in the mid-term. We are all trying to figure out an answer to that but nobody really knows how it will grow fast in the next few years. We see some numbers and projections for the future but nowadays there are many external factors that affect this transformation,” says Puerta. 

“Each country will react to this trend in a different and uncertain way so adapting strategies for different paced markets will be a huge challenge for companies like ours.” 

Seals

Seals products, developed with nanotechnology, create a barrier against weathering on treated surfaces, from gelcoat and PVC to glass, fabric and steel.

Francesco Losavio, Seals sales manager, explains: “Hulls, sails, portholes, motors, and dinghies all need special protection that the traditional coating technology cannot adequately offer. Seals, with its nanotechnology, provides an innovative solution that protects boats from environmental elements, ensuring durability and reducing the need for frequent maintenance, thus significantly lowering maintenance costs.”

Losavio believes products currently on the market do not effectively prohibit or inhibit boat degradation following exposure to harsh environments. “Seals is fine-tuned to protect against the harsh elements of the marine environment that include salt, corrosion, and UV exposure. We are the only ones on the market using nano diamond technology, which is able to provide superior protection with a very limited quantity of product. Existing alternatives are merely adaptations of generic coatings used, for example, on cars or bicycles and applied to surfaces that are just not the same.” 

Losavio expects the products to be well received across all segments: “With Seals, charter companies will appreciate the significant reduction in the time and water required to prepare the boat for the next rental; the yacht owner will find that crew members will spend less time on daily maintenance; boat manufacturers will provide boats to clients that will maintain their value longer; boat owners will discover the ease of maintaining the boat on their own.

“Today’s boat owners are adopting a forward-thinking approach, increasingly focused on long-term product quality, cost reduction and sustainable practices. They value and prioritise innovation and eco friendliness. Seals aligns perfectly with these evolving priorities.”

The other startups in Yachting Venture’s Start-Up Pavilion included AirMarker – the emergency visual beacon; AnywherEnergy Systems, a small scalable power generation system based on solid-oxide fuel cell; and BlueGrid Insights – a tool to inform pathways towards vessel decarbonisation. Also on show were BoatOn, an app and web-based maintenance management system; Helios Marine, manufacturer of modular and flexible IP67 marine battery systems using LFP cells; iWarranty, a new warranty management system; Supiore, a new solar panel bimini, SimplyDC, a range of modular DC power modular components; and Other Skies, offering three-dimensional creative outputs for designers.