Nernst Electric raises €1.7M seed to bring ceramic membrane oxygen generation to fish farms

Nernst Electric, an Irish startup founded in 2023 by Nick Farandos (CEO) and Chris Matson, has raised a €1.7 million ($2 million) seed from Hatch Blue's Blue Revolution Fund, a Cork-based aquaculture-focused investment vehicle. The company builds ceramic solid oxide membrane units that generate high-purity oxygen on-site for fish farms and heavy industry, replacing the trucked liquid oxygen and PSA/VSA generators that currently supply the sector.

Nernst first entered the Hatch Blue portfolio in July 2025, receiving pre-seed funding via the Hatch Accelerator Fund II and joining the firm's accelerator programme. The seed from the Blue Revolution Fund follows that accelerator track and marks the step from working system to first deployed pilot.

The oxygen supply problem in aquaculture

Fish farms require a continuous, large-volume supply of dissolved oxygen to maintain fish density and growth rates. The two conventional supply methods each carry structural constraints: trucked liquid oxygen is expensive, prone to supply chain disruption, and logistically demanding for remote coastal sites; on-site PSA (Pressure Swing Adsorption) and VSA generators are mechanically complex, require significant maintenance, and output oxygen at purity levels that can vary with ambient conditions.

Nernst Electric's technology addresses both constraints simultaneously. Its units use ceramic membranes to electrochemically separate oxygen from ambient air, producing a continuous stream at greater than 99% purity. The company combines novel additive manufacturing with advanced solid oxide electrochemistry to produce compact units with near-zero maintenance requirements and operating costs the company says are the lowest in the industry.

"For decades, the limitations of conventional on-site oxygen generation have held back productivity across industries including aquaculture, mining, metallurgy, and steelmaking," said Nick Farandos. "Our breakthrough reactor technology removes those barriers, enabling the most efficient oxygen production at any scale with near-zero maintenance and the industry's lowest operating costs."

What Hatch Blue is backing

Hatch Blue has now backed Nernst twice: its accelerator fund took the company from manufacturing concept to working system; the Blue Revolution Fund seed finances the next step — a pilot unit deployed in a real aquaculture environment.

"Since Nernst joined our Accelerator Fund, their progress has been fast and convincing. The team came in with a manufacturing concept and have built it into a working system ready for its first aquaculture deployment. That kind of technical execution is impressive — and it is precisely why the Blue Revolution Fund is the right backer to take it further," said Caitriona Kelleher, Managing Director of Early Stage Investments at Hatch Blue.

The cross-sector application is a material part of the investor thesis. Carsten Krome, Managing Partner at Hatch Blue, noted that "aquaculture is generating commercially attractive innovation at pace, and the sector's own fundamentals are strong. Much of that innovation also has reach well beyond it. Nernst is a clear example: the platform that solves critical oxygen supply for fish farms has industrial-scale application across heavy industry. That is exactly what gives the Blue Revolution Fund the conviction to back it."

The €1.7 million funds construction of Nernst's first pilot-scale unit for real-world aquaculture deployment. A successful demonstration is the stated prerequisite for commercial customer trials and a subsequent Series A. The technology's claim — >99% purity at lower operating cost and near-zero maintenance — must be confirmed under field conditions, not only in laboratory settings, before the industrial-scale applications in mining, steel, and energy can be developed at commercial scale.