K-Ren has secured a 1.2 million euro funding package to accelerate the transition to clean navigation solutions.
The company, based in Mauguio in Southern France, has developed an eco-friendly alternative alternative to antifoul coatings.
The company’s flagship product is a custom textile cover, the K-Ren Protect, that wraps around the submerged part of a boat’s hull to provide protection against fouling when the boat is afloat.
The product was developed and patented by Bernard Doriez as a sustainable way to avoid the necessity of applying and re-applying traditional antifoul paints, with the pollution it entails.
Bernard was joined by his daughter Lucie and the pair co-founded K-Ren, transforming the invention into an industrial solution.
Growth of marine organisms
The protective boat hull cover acts as a physical barrier around the hull, limiting direct contact between the hull and the marine environment, while also reducing conditions that are favourable to the growth of marine organisms.
The financing brings together several investors including the Banque Populaire du Sud ‘s Sud Mer Invest fund, business angels and K-Ren’s community of users.
Over the next few months, K-Ren will now accelerate production capacity, strengthening the its manufacturing production to gain responsiveness and improve the company’s impact.
The company says it will concentrate on deploying its antifoul solution in ports and continue to demonstrate, with real users to back it up, that a clean hull can be achieved without the use of any polluting products.
The fundraising will allow it to deploy its solutions on a large scale, with the investment enabling the company to restructure its commercial centre and personnel with the objective of supporting more boaters towards cleaner sailing.
