At VivaTech 2025 in Paris, Tinental CEO Elin Flyger was interviewed by École polytechnique, where the start-up exhibited as part of the X-novation incubator. The interview explains how Tinental's AI and IoT retrofit cuts the energy consumed by industrial pumps, fans and other fluid machinery by up to 60%, with exactly the same production output.
Reaching net zero by 2050 depends on a problem few people know about: energy waste. Fluid dynamic machinery, meaning everything that moves air or liquid, from pumps and ventilators to turbines and chillers, accounts for about 50 to 70% of the energy consumed by industry, and industry is the largest end user of energy worldwide.
Much of this machinery is oversized by design. It lasts at least 25 years, so when a company buys it, it has to foresee the future growth of the factory and the peaks in production. The result is machinery that is naturally oversized by 30 to 50%.
Tinental has developed an AI that, together with an IoT device, is installed on existing fluid dynamic machinery. It reduces energy consumption by up to 60% with exactly the same production output, a new efficiency benchmark for industry.
As a green tech company, Tinental offers the solution for free: companies pay nothing to get it, and Tinental is paid only through a percentage of the actual savings. This makes it accessible to everyone, not only to wealthy industries but also to small businesses and to companies in developing countries. The model is a win-win: scalable for the climate, and good for companies, which lower their energy bill and become more competitive on international markets.
Innovative start-ups come in two kinds: those that take a known technology and make it better, and those that do something that has never been done before. Tinental belongs to the second group, so the first reaction is often disbelief: if this is possible, why has nobody done it before? As with every new invention, somebody has to be first.
VivaTech was a chance to show that it works. In June 2025 Tinental had 12 projects running in Europe, eight of them with billion-dollar companies, which see an efficient operational benchmark as a must for the future.
Thanks to École polytechnique and the X-novation team for hosting us at VivaTech 2025.
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