Investment in blue carbon and ocean regeneration has reached another landmark today, with the news that SWEN Capital Partners' Blue Ocean Fund closes with a landmark €170 million, far exceeding its original target of €120 million.
Since its launch, the Blue Ocean Fund has made eight investments in innovative start-up companies, with further deals in the pipeline. The investments are intended to tackle three main existential threats affecting ocean health: over-fishing, pollution and climate change.
One of the fund's recipients is Norwegian technology start-up OptoScale, which has developed a solution for accurate and real time fish biomass measurement and sealice counting. Other investments include Nature Metrics, a UK-based world-leading provider of biodiversity monitoring data, and Spinergie, a French software company providing big data analytics to substantially reduce fuel consumption of maritime transport.
"Faced with the threats generated by human activities, we are convinced that research and innovation are essential keys to ensuring the protection of the ocean," said Jérôme Delmas, CEO of SWEN Capital Partners.
"It is with this in mind that we have decided to participate in supporting start-ups whose activities could have a positive impact on the health of the ocean."
The fund was launched in September last year at the World Conservation Congress, in scientific partnership with leading oceanographic institute Ifremer. The fund is expected to finance 20 to 25 innovative start-up companies in a range of sectors related to ocean health. These include sustainable aquaculture, ocean data, plant and cell-based seafood, alternatives to single-use plastic, renewable marine energies and decarbonization of maritime transport.
"We believe ocean impact investing is gaining traction among mainstream investors and we want to play our part in this evolution, said Christian Lim, Managing Director of SWEN Blue Ocean Fund.
"The ocean is the main engine of the climate, yet it is under existential threat. Our fund provides investors with the opportunity to combat these challenges at scale, while seeking to achieve competitive market returns."
The Blue Ocean Fund is not the only investment fund focused on ocean health to be in the headlines recently. Last month, Ocean 14 Capital impact fund announced it had reached 150 million following a substantial investment from the Ikea group.
SWEN Capital Partners is a leading player in responsible investment in unlisted assets in Europe. With €7 billion (calculated as the amount of accumulated liabilities) under management, the asset management firm offers a wide range of investment programmes for institutional and private clients. Additionally, it integrates ESG criteria in all its asset management activities and has been implementing a climate strategy since 2017.
In 2019, the firm reinforced its actions in favour of fairer and more sustainable growth by launching its first impact fund dedicated to renewable gas. Its increasingly strong convictions led the management company to go further in 2021 by launching its new impact management strategy dedicated to ocean regeneration.
Since January 2022, SWEN Capital Partners is a co-shareholder of the NEC Initiative, a company with an independent mission and developer of a methodology allowing socio-economic actors to measure their contribution to the ecological transition towards a common goal: the construction of a responsible and sustainable economy.
