Belgium-based Aloxy raises €3.8M for its plug-and-play Industrial IoT platform

Antwerp, Belgium-based Aloxy, a company that enables industrial Internet of Things (IoT) by offering a modular IoT platform for the petrochemical industry, announced that it has raised €3.8M in a fresh round of funding.

In the coming year, Aloxy says it will focus on growing its sales activities as well as expanding the product range, and further developing the Aloxy Industrial IoT Hub platform.

Investors in this round

The round was led by a new investor Industrya, a hands-on investment fund that operates exclusively in the industry 4.0, energy and new materials sectors.

Alexandre Braconnier, chief investment officer at Industrya, says, “We have been impressed by the quality of the team and the solution developed by Aloxy. The market potential is large. The precise monitoring of valves is a crucial safety element for the oil & gas sector as well as other manufacturing and industrial sectors. Aloxy was, therefore, a logical investment for Industrya and we are looking forward to supporting the company in its international development.”

Funds also came from a consortium of investors, including QBIC II, Innovation Fund, imec.istart and the University of Antwerp.

Sofie Baeten, CEO Qbic II Fund, says, “As an investor from the very start, we are happy to continue supporting the development of Aloxy. Over the last years, the company has succeeded in further developing technology from academic research to commercial products, in a market with very high standards and high requirements for new (digital) technologies. A strong technology basis and persistence have allowed Aloxy to create the initial commercial traction, which will be further accelerated with the current investment round.”

What does Aloxy offer?

Launched in 2018  by Maarten Weyn and Glenn Ergeerts, Aloxy is a spin-off of imec and the University of Antwerp, and develops plug-and-play IoT technology for the chemical and energy industry. The company has created tailored solutions for the chemical and energy industries to help them make the leap to “Industry 4.0”. 

Aloxy has created an annual valve monitoring system using wireless LPWAN communication technologies like LoRaWAN. The present solution combines a valve sensor and the “Aloxy IIoT Hub”, an industrial IoT platform for managing a fleet of IoT devices, monitoring and optimising network connectivity, and feeding sensor data to clients’ systems.

Aloxy reports that the transformation to “Industry 4.0” is already underway, and key industry players are increasingly investing in IoT and wireless network infrastructures. The first demand came from Europe, but it was quickly followed by the US, and demand is growing in other places such as South America and Asia.

The digitisation of the chemical and energy industry can be further accelerated when more Ex-certified (explosion-proof) wireless sensors hit the market. Aloxy is currently prototyping a new device, the Aloxy.Connect, to connect PT100 temperature and 4-20 mA probes.

Funds to scale up

Aloxy says that the proceeds will be used to continue its growth. After the company’s recent expansion into North America, both the European and US sales teams will be increased to further grow the awareness of the valve monitoring solution.

CEO Aloxy, Jan Coppens, says, “While we continue to expand the country-specific certifications of our valve sensor and focus on pursuing ISO27001 certification, we are preparing the organisation for accelerated growth. Our strategy is built on three pillars: increasing the industry-wide adoption of our valve monitoring solution, scale-up the “Aloxy IIoT Hub” platform and launching new Ex-certified sensors.”

The Aloxy.Connect prototype is currently being evaluated in non-Ex environments and will be further finalised, including Ex-certification, mobile app development, and probe integration.

In addition, the “Aloxy IIoT Hub” platform is also being expanded with third-party sensors to become the central IoT management platform for its customers’ entire sensor fleet over different network protocols.