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Spotlight | Some of Aberdeen’s Most Interesting Tech Startups
DIGIT shines the spotlight on an impressive group of emerging tech startups in and around the Scottish city of Aberdeen.
While sometimes overlooked by its larger Scottish cousins by way of Edinburgh and Glasgow, Aberdeen is home to a bustling tech community nonetheless.
The city is traditionally known as a hub for the oil and gas industry, but as the UK repositions itself on the backdrop of the wider push towards clean energy, so has Aberdeen.
According to the most recent energy sector briefing by the Scottish government, employment in the energy growth sector was highest in Aberdeen city and Aberdeenshire, together making up 46% of employment in the sector.
Alongside this, Aberdeen is home to top educational institutions such as Robert Gordon University, and the University of Aberdeen. Both of these universities have excellent entrepreneurial programmes, such as RGU’s Entrepreneurship and Innovation group and the University of Aberdeen’s ABVentures, which support the development of new businesses and inspire innovation among students.
Outside of the universities, Aberdeen is home to a number of incubators and accelerators. Notably, ElevatorUK which helps roughly 3,500 new businesses start up each year across Scotland, and runs a fully funded 12-week accelerator delivered in Aberdeen each year.
Aberdeen is also home to the Net Zero Technology Centre, which brings together scientists and engineers in its TechX Ventures programme to create new clean energy companies that help accelerate an affordable energy transition.
Looking through all these great success stories, DIGIT wanted to highlight some of the startups that are new to the scene, but poised to make a big impact.
1. Sequetrics Limited
Sequestrics Limited is a startup founded in 2019, that has developed a technology to provide insights on surface quality. It does this with an advanced analytics platform that uses artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) to generate advisory to its clients about cracks, objects, water, ice, and debris at high resolution.
It does this from vast volumes of data gleaned from sensing and imaging devices. “Multi-modal sensor technology combined with data analytics will help reduce human errors to assess runway conditions.”
The startup secured funding from RGU’s Accelerator in 2019, as well as from the Scottish Funding Council in 2021 and Scottish Enterprise for undisclosed amounts. At the moment, it is participating in the SmartThings Accelerator Centre, a Scottish accelerator dedicated to IoT startup tech.
2. Encomara
Formed in 2022 from four industry veterans with more than 30 years of experience in the energy sector, launched its flagship technology, which is poised to improve the life-cycle, safety, sustainability and reliability of floating offshore wind operations.
Encomara’s patented product, SQUID, serves as a quick connector for cables, mooring lines, and anchor interfaces, allowing for ‘plug-to-power’ capabilities. This pre-installation and pre-commissioning of marine hardware, according to Encomara, will reduce both the cost and risk associated with installing the offshore turbines.
The startup is focusing on expanding its team to recruit more onshore personnel and engineers over the next few months to advance its technologies.
3. SeaWeed Energy
SeaWeed Energy is another success story out of Aberdeen’s RGU. It has designed a compact wave energy converter that can be installed as either a standalone unit or with multiple connected devices.
The system, called Kelp, can extract energy from the shoreline out to deeper waters offshore. It is designed based on an oscillating wave surge converter type device that can harness underwater wave surge force.
Earlier this year, the startup landed £100,100 in funding from the Scottish Government’s flagship Just Transition Fund, which is investing £500 million over ten years, and aimed at accelerating energy transition and job security in the north-east and Moray.
4. Oasis Marine Power
Oasis Marine Power launched in 2020 as a subsidiary of Jebb Smith Ltd, in an effort to innovate marine mooring systems. Its flagship technology, the Oasis Power Buoy, allows vessels to moor up and recharge from a zero-emission wind turbine.
Oasis Marine Power was recently selected to lead an offshore charging station along with three other organisations. The project will benefit from £1.5 million in funding, handed down from the UK’s £60 million Clean Maritime Demonstration Competition (CMDC) grant funding to install the world’s first offshore charging station within a UK wind farm.
5. Hydrowheel
Hydrowheel is a Aberdeen-based company founded in 2021 which has developed an inflatable water wheel that generates affordable, accessible renewable energy with less damage to the local ecosystem.
The hydro wheel is compact and easily transportable. It floats on the water, which produces less damage to local ecosystems. This also allows it to glean energy from a broader section of a stream, and be tethered together with other sections to be larger.
Hydrowheel is a success story out of the Net Zero Technology Centre’s TechX Ventures programme, where it participated in the 2023 cohort and received £100,000 in funding.
6. Leap Automation
Leap Automation makes end of line automation and vision systems for food producers. Initially the company was founded in 2018 focusing on industrial robotics. In 2020, the company pivoted to the food sector amidst the covid pandemic, finding its niche and a gap in the market to flourish.
Since then the company has raised over £3 million with significant investments from Alba Equity and Scottish Enterprise. After this, the company doubled its team from 21 to 42, and is now in a position to scale its operations. This summer at the KPMG Tech Innovator awards it won top place in the Scotland regional pitch event, and eventually bronze at the UK-wide event.
7. TrackGenesis
This startup was founded in 2019, using blockchain technology to create solutions in sectors such as supply chain management, food and beverage, and e-waste management. The startup came out of Robert Gordon University’s Startup accelerator programme, and also took part in the ONE Digital Accelerator programme in 2019.
One of the startup’s flagship projects is a secure and seamless platform to facilitate data sharing over the blockchain. This plug-and-play Blockchain as a Service (BaaS) allows companies to connect to the platform utilising APIs without having to know about blockchain programming.
The startup has recently secured a £10,000 grant from the Space Climate programme to use earth monitoring, satellite navigation, and data management systems to offer food producers and consumers insight on the carbon footprint of their food’s supply chain.
8. RIPCELL
Founded in 2021 by a lecturer and member of the solid-state research group at the University of Aberdeen, RIPCELL uses a patented process called the BiCircular Solution to use waste to recycle waste. This process can release high grade materials back into the market, and create a closed loop system for manufacturer.
Notably, RIPCELL claims that their patented process can reduce the carbon footprint of the EV manufacturing industry by more than 60%. The timing for this is critical, as the UK needs to increase its critical metals by up to 9,000% to reach anticipated Gigafactory capacity, according to Benchmark Minerals. The BiCircular Solution will act to secure an internal supply of lithium, cobalt, manganese, copper, and aluminium.
The startup recently landed £626, 734 to pilot a technology that uses a waste product from whisky production called pot ale to deploy a ‘green solvent’ that can be used in recycling batteries. The funding came from the £50 million instalment of the Just Transition Fund, which is investing £500 million over ten years in the north-east and Moray.
9. Mygo4ward
While not based in Aberdeen, the Elgin-based startup is hard to overlook. It was founded in 2019 by an experienced physiotherapists and a movement practitioner looking to improve the lives of people with spinal cord injuries and neurological disabilities. Their flagship technology, the MyGo, is a wearable ‘exoskeleton’ technology that uses strategically placed printed conductive electrodes to improve mobility in patients with spinal cord or neurological disabilities.
The startup won ‘Innovator of the Year’ in last year’s Elevator UK competition, and landed £46,128 in grant funding from Innovate UK to pilot their MyGo technology. The company also landed a £15,000 funding package from the Scottish Edge Awards back in 2020, and crowd-funded just over £13,000 from an IndieGoGo campaign last year, with the goal of finishing the development of its prototype. Earlier this year, the company finally received its patent certificate for the MyGo product.
Which new, interesting Aberdeen tech companies are on your radar?
If there’s a particular startup that you’d like to champion — and think would be at home in a list like this — feel free to let us know via LinkedIn, Twitter, or by email via the editor@digit.fyi address.
