French Algal Producer Wins Aquaculture Innovation Award

Inalve, a French firm that aims to produce 100,000 tonnes of\r\nalgae a year for use in sectors including aquaculture feeds and fish health\r\nproducts, has won this year’s Audience Award for Innovation at today’s\r\nAquaculture Innovation Europe event.

The prize was collected by CEO, Christophe Vasseur, who\r\npipped a dozen other start-ups to the post, following three sessions of pitches\r\nover the two-day event.

Inalve, which established\r\na 10-tonne per annum pilot production facility in the south of France this\r\nyear, plans to produce both a protein-rich algae meal, which he projects can be\r\nsold for a price comparable to fishmeal, at around $1,500 per tonne, and “an\r\nalgae boost, for providing health and providing growth for the animals”, which\r\nwill be launched at $20,000 per tonne. Vasseur outlined that this “very low\r\nenvironmental footprint” greenhouse-based production system will “change the\r\nway we grow microalgae”.

Inalve CEO, Christophe Vasseur, is presented with the\r\nInnovation Award by Lawrence Brown, animal sciences and aquaculture sector\r\nspecialist at the UK's Department for International Trade and innovation

He also claimed to have advantages over insect and other\r\nplant-based proteins, due to their algal meal having 95 percent digestibility,\r\nand noted that “in the last three years we have won more than 10 innovation\r\nprizes”, including recognition from livestock feed giants Cargill and Nutreco.\r\nOther elements he highlighted were “a very successful proof of concept” and the\r\nfact that they had managed to raise €3 million in private investment over three\r\nyears. Currently building a plant in the south of France, the company aims to\r\nlaunch the first product on the market in 2020.

The award was decided by the 120-strong delegates at the\r\nLondon gathering, who were given the chance to award a mark out of ten for\r\nseven different aspects of each pitch. These ranged from evaluating the\r\ncommercial demand for each product, to the originality of the concept, to the\r\nquality of the teams each start-up had assembled.

Inalve narrowly defeated Stavanger-based Fishency Innovations, which has developed\r\nan automated, continuous means counting sea lice called the SmartFunnel.\r\nFounder Flavie Gohin told delegates at the event how the device was already\r\nable to count lice on over 100 salmon a day, that Norway’s second biggest\r\nsalmon producer was planning on using the device, and that the company had\r\nrecently secured NOK 3 million in funding from Link Venture Capital.

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Meanwhile, Observe\r\nTechnologies, which uses artificial intelligence to reduce the\r\nbiggest costs on fish farms, from feeding to health, came in third place. Their\r\nsystem, explained co-founder and CEO Hemang Rishi, is already in use in 300\r\nsalmon farm pens in four different countries.

Source : The Fish SIte