ACES 2013 finalist OsmoBlue wins €40,000 prize at Climate-KIC Venture Competition

Swiss start-up OsmoBlue has won first prize at the 2013 Climate-KIC Venture Competition for clean-technology start-ups.

Spun-out of research at École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Élodie Dahan’s company OsmoBlue uses patented technology to convert low-temperature waste heat, as low as 30°C, into energy. The scalable system harvests unexploited waste energy to produce hundreds of kW of electricity. OsmoBlue’s products can help industries from different sectors save money and reduce their carbon footprint, while improving their corporate image.

OsmoBlue was one of thirteen finalists competing at the annual Innovation Festival organised by Climate-KIC, a Knowledge and Innovation Community created in 2010 by the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT).

This award follows OsmoBlue’s selection as a finalist in the Energy & Environment category of the 5th Academic Enterprise Awards (ACES) in June 2013. Along with another EPFL spin-off, OsmoBlue was chosen as one of eight finalists by a jury drawn from academia, industry and venture capital. The ACES awards programme - the only pan-European awards for academic spin-outs - was created in 2008 by Science|Business.

The 2013 winners’ conference was held at the European Parliament in Brussels, where awards were given across four categories: energy and environment; ICT; life sciences; and materials and chemicals. The winners were chosen by the Science|Business Innovation Board. The prizes were announced and awarded at a gala dinner at the Plaza Theatre, Brussels.