Green shipping start-up Daphne Technology has brought heavyweight investors including Shell Ventures and Trafigura on board.
Saudi Aramco Energy Ventures and MISC Berhad-owned Malaysian tanker operator AET have also taken stakes in the Swiss company, which is developing technology to remove CO2 and other pollutants from vessel exhausts.
Daphne said it has continued to attract world leaders in its latest funding round.
The company uses its own technology to remove toxic and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions such as CO2, nitrogen oxides and methane from the combustion gas of any fuel type, including oil, LNG, biofuels, ammonia and hydrogen.
The plug-and-play solution breaks down the pollutants, converting them into non-hazardous by-products, which are either released into the environment or transformed into valuable products, the company said.
The heavy fuel oil system transforms pollutants into fertiliser that can be sold, while the LNG unit cuts 90% of methane slip, Daphne claims.
The start-up said it is pursuing commercial deployment and scale-up. It has 25 staff, with eight commercial staff in Oslo and the rest at its Lausanne headquarters.
"Because Daphne's technology can be applied to multiple fuel types, it has the potential to make a substantial impact across the energy system," the company said.
New investor Shell Ventures led the latest CHF 10m ($10.97m) capital raise, along with Trafigura and AET.
All previous investors put in more money, including Saudi Aramco Energy Ventures, which previously had a 24% stake.
This is the second fundraising round since Daphne was spun off from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in 2018.
'Enormous potential'
"We are proud to have attracted best-in-class strategic investors all committed to working together with Daphne for an economically sustainable energy transition," said founder and chief executive Mario Michan.
"The capital raise enables us to deploy our systems and expand our portfolio of emission-reduction solutions. The transition to a more sustainable economy represents a historic investment opportunity."
Peter van Giessel, investment director at Shell Ventures, said Daphne's technology addresses a key challenge when it comes to reducing shipping's GHG emissions.
"Their plug-and-play solution has enormous potential to also help other sectors, and we look forward to supporting them in their journey," he added.
Margaux Moore, head of energy transition research at Trafigura, said the innovative approach has the potential to become a pivotal technology for the maritime industry.
"The ability to capture emissions from hydrocarbon maritime fuels and meaningfully reduce emissions in the short term is a critical component of the industry's transition to net zero emissions, in which multiple fuels and multiple abatement solutions will be required," she said.
Captain Rajalingam Subramaniam, AET's chief executive, said the investment marks the company's entry into research and development for emissions reduction.
"As a believer in LNG as a longer-term solution in maritime decarbonisation, we have been looking for technologies to reduce the methane slip and improve the 'tank to wake' decarbonisation environment," he said.
AET will deploy and test the technology across its vessels that use LNG as a fuel source.
Since first publication, the number and location of staff have been amended.
